Dive Brief:
- A new study finds that the Expanded Success Initiative, part of a U.S. Department of Education effort to narrow the achievement gap, did not improve the status of young black and Latino men at the 40 New York City high schools that received a $250,000 grant through the program, which focused on schools with high graduation rates but low college-readiness data, Chalkbeat reports.
- While the approach used by each school varied, they were asked to improve college readiness by bolstering academics, college counseling and career preparation, and to implement mentoring, tutoring and leadership opportunities. They also were encouraged to promote new, less-stringent approaches to student discipline.
- The report on the program showed about 16% of participating students met college-ready criteria, compared to 18.6% at other similar city schools that the report studied.
Dive Insight:
The report found results may have been disappointing because of inconsistent strategies at the schools that sometimes didn’t specifically focus on college-readiness. Funding also only supported the effort for the first two of the four years studied.
But there were also some positive results: The students went on more college trips, got better college counseling, and often participated in mentoring programs. Student attitudes about school and potentially attending college improved, too.
A recent report from the college testing firm ACT and the United Negro College Fund shows that while African-American students are achieving better in school generally, they are still lagging behind in college readiness with only 5% of students in ACT tests meeting college-readiness benchmarks for first-year college courses and 79% of African-American students meeting one or none.
Two leading researchers studying college attendance have recently published a book that suggests to increase college-readiness among disadvantaged students, educators need to provide more academic support, counseling and financial aid — but also that schools need to offer more varied career paths to jobs, including more that lead directly to the job market, beginning in high school.