Back to A Comparative AnalysisBy Michal Smith-Mello
From Listening to Kentucky High Schools
pp. 57-68, published 2002
If we are to transform Kentucky high schools into places where learning and its immense possibilities become inviting adventures worthy of lifelong pursuit, dramatic change will be needed. To transform these critically important institutions, it will be necessary to counter the alienation and disengagement that appear to be so prevalent among high school students. At the same time, it will be necessary to engender a new culture in high schools that is driven by committed, entrepreneurial leaders and defined by a fuller understanding of and a responsiveness to the needs of today’s youth, which, in spite of their seeming independence and maturity, may be greater than ever before.
With these lofty but, we believe, achievable goals in mind, we offer the following action items not only for the consideration of education officials and policymakers in Frankfort, but also, and perhaps more importantly, to community, business, and school leaders, from school board members to classroom teachers, across the state. Ultimately, the job of educating our youth belongs to those on the front lines of our schools. Regardless of edicts from Frankfort, the passion and energy for doing the job of educating our youth right must emanate from them. In turn, our communities—parents, interested citizens, and the educational institutions, businesses, and industries that rely upon the talents and abilities of the young people who are products of these schools—must expect and even demand excellence from every school and every educator. With that in mind, we offer the following action items.
As we believe these case studies reveal, leadership is key to shaping high school cultures that engage and challenge young people academically, enrich them socially, and, perhaps most importantly, value them individually.
Given today’s enriched understanding of leadership in the workplace, we know that effective leaders exist at all levels of hierarchies, and truly successful appointed leaders are those who, among other things:
engage teachers, counselors, staff, parents, and the larger community in shaping and realizing a shared vision of the preferred future for each student as well as the school;
make the case for investment in that vision to school boards and ultimately to the larger community;
inspire and facilitate trust and cooperation;
through continuous learning opportunities, empower staff—and students—to experiment with and discover new curricula and more effective, responsive teaching methods, programs, and reward systems;
cultivate and formalize routine communications between school personnel and students, their families, and the larger community;
develop effective working relationships with "customers," local and regional colleges, and "suppliers," middle and grade schools that permit each to play mutually supportive roles;
enhance a sense of school ownership that, in turn, increases student, faculty, parent, and community commitment to its achievements, from performance on the CATS tests to critically important postsecondary outcomes;
continuously measure outcomes to determine the effectiveness of programs, teaching methods, personnel, etc., and make corrections and improvements as needed; and,
dare to seek student assessments and opinions and respond to their criticisms and needs in a timely, thoughtful way.
By providing education and training in leadership and management skills to both future principals and teachers who train in our universities and colleges, and in continuing education and professional development opportunities, we can cultivate far more effective leaders in our schools and classrooms. Arguably, we should expect a requisite amount of training in these vital skills of those who assume leadership of classrooms and schools. Likewise, school boards and site-based councils need such training to identify leadership qualities and management skills in candidates for the posts they are responsible for filling and to evaluate performances. Moreover, as the Prichard Committee is now exploring in its work, it is likely that leadership training for interested parents and citizens will foster more effective advocates for students, schools, and education in general and cultivate the level of social capital we need to achieve better results. In short, leadership and management skills must become an integral focus in the curricula of education schools, in professional development initiatives, and in other areas that will enhance the capacity of the larger education community.
At the same time, as we note subsequently, we must recognize that progress in regard to postsecondary outcomes is, at least in part, a reflection of leadership and management skills. Unless continuous improvement in postsecondary performance is an expectation of these professionals, a criteria for evaluating their performance both at the local and the state level, we cannot hope to realize the goals we have set for the future.
The clarity of vision that emanates from a truly effective leader energizes and empowers employees to learn, to become more entrepreneurial, to experiment, to strive constantly for improvement, and, ultimately, to become leaders in their own right. In turn, they can become a source of inspiration to students. In short, leaders energize an institution, regardless of its mission, as we saw in High School A, and, to a lesser extent, in Schools B and C.
In turn, they can and will shape the answers to the central question we ask here, "How can we increase postsecondary enrollment and improve academic success?" Their entrepreneurial energy will give life to positive, productive student-faculty relationships; meaningful, rewarding courses; effective, results-oriented programs; caring, compassionate responses to those in need of support; and improved social, academic, and postsecondary outcomes.
We have long known that educators, particularly teachers, can play critical, transforming roles in the lives of young people, but these case studies suggest that a not insignificant portion of them may be negative rather than positive forces in the lives of young people. If the defeatist attitudes we encountered in some education professionals are shared by other educators that students routinely encounter, they will continue to discourage young people from achievement. Given the tremendous obstacles that potential first-generation college-goers already face, educators cannot be instruments of negativism. Instead, they must be sources of inspiration, providing a consistent counterpoint to families and friends who may devalue education and offering a constant, steady voice of optimism and possibilities.
Only united, committed staffs in our high schools, and schools at all levels for that matter, can help young people and, ultimately, the Commonwealth of Kentucky realize optimum postsecondary outcomes. A fragmented or divided school with disillusioned staff, regardless of the resources available to it, cannot foster improved academic and postsecondary outcomes. Leadership is key.
While small in scope, we encountered some remarkable special programs during the conduct of these case studies. Students who were engaged in these programs were testaments to their remarkable benefits. While broader adoption of the program for underachievers would likely help improve outcomes for many Kentucky high school students, its focus is limited. However, several elements of this program, many of which have been broadly adopted by High School A, should, we believe, become standard fare in Kentucky’s high schools. They include:
Formal liaisons with middle schools—and area colleges—that permit educators at all of these institutions to jointly identify and address needs that will permit more successful transitions to the various levels of education and ensure adequate academic preparation;
Peer tutoring and peer counseling by academically successful students, preferably for which they are paid, eliminating the need for them to seek employment off site, encouraging continued levels of competency among those who are tutoring and being tutored, and providing important peer mentors;
Rapid intervention in the form of tutoring or counseling when problems with grades, homework, attendance, etc., arise—not after they have precipitated failure;
Comprehensive orientation for all entering freshmen that acclimates them to the environment, trains them in study skills, and even, as High School A does, provides some of the life skills preparation they will soon need, from balancing jobs and schoolwork to comprehensive understanding of the costs, future benefits, and preparation needed to go to college.
If we know that Kentucky’s future depends upon its ability to enroll more first-generation college students, we must focus increased resources on those students we know are least likely to go on to college, namely those who are at risk, that is, students who are poor, who enter high school with poor reading skills, and whose home life circumstances interfere substantially with their schooling. To do so will require further investment in interventions such as those we saw at High Schools A and B, in social workers and counselors who can guide and encourage students with behavior problems and tutors who can provide intensive one-on-one academic support that will enable students to gain lost ground rapidly.
Importantly, college site visits and other off-site educational experiences that expose young people to life possibilities beyond their immediate environs that they may not otherwise experience are vitally important. Participation in such activities must not be restricted to those who can afford them if we are to make gains among would-be first-generation college-goers.
Unfortunately, high school interventions come too late in many cases. Ultimately, greater investment must be targeted where these case studies and our high school survey suggest they will be most effective, at the elementary and middle-school levels. In addition to ensuring that all students, particularly those who are not receiving encouragement and support at home, are prepared academically, we must open their minds to possibilities. Because students begin to form visions of their futures at early ages, it is key that we reinforce the possibility of college, its affordability, and its enormous benefits frequently, persuasively, and consistently. Instilling children of the Commonwealth with a belief and confidence in their potential, no matter what their life circumstances, must become central to education.
Moreover, we must add new voices of experience beyond those of educators to those children hear. Successful Kentuckians, particularly those who arose from poor circumstances, can impart messages in person or via teleconferencing or on videotape that can form the foundation for writing and other academic exercises even as they encourage and foster dreams. Such a program, perhaps utilizing and expanding materials already developed by Kentucky Educational Television, could become an effective teaching tool that nourishes new visions.
Refinement of the performance accountability criteria for schools, these case studies suggest, is needed. Most notably, accountability measures for schools must give far more weight to postsecondary outcomes. A myopic focus on results of the CATS tests belies the clear understanding among both educators and students at the high-school level that these tests are of little or no consequence to their futures. Indeed, one principal notes that results show that the best students are among the least concerned about their performance on these tests.
On the other hand, whether a school meets its predicted postsecondary outcomes is a vitally important, noncognitive measure of "success." Further, whether schools fully apprise and educate all students about their postsecondary options, facilitate the necessary college preparatory steps, send an appropriate portion of students on to college, and provide an academic foundation that enables their persistence in college has a great deal to do with the quality of their high school and its educators. These outcomes—and performance criteria—should be routinely measured in light of the kind of comprehensive data that the Long-Term Policy Research Center gathered about high schools, data that tell us more about how schools should be performing, rather than the static data that are now collected and reported but seldom evaluated. If we are truly dedicated to improving education at every level, the failure to achieve expected postsecondary outcomes and continuously improve them must be considered key criteria for school accountability and, arguably, professional competency.
Likewise, School Report Cards, which are important accountability and data collection tools, could provide parents and other interested parties, including researchers, with far more comprehensive profiles of schools. For example, neither raw numbers (i.e., the number of students whose parent or guardian had at least one teacher conference) nor averages paint truly accurate portraits of schools. At the same time, valuable information that is clearly pertinent to performance, such as postsecondary outcomes, is not included, nor is there information on counseling resources and activities or on programmatic support for academic and social problems. In short, these report cards should answer questions about the personnel, time, and energy a school dedicates to ensuring that its students are fully informed about and prepared to make critical life decisions. This kind of information appears far more relevant than the disproportionate amount of space dedicated to "school safety." While schools should and must be concerned about safety, its level of importance should not be permitted to eclipse the fundamental purpose of these institutions, that is, to educate young people and prepare them for the future. Indeed, such information should be relegated to the expanded report card, rather than the far more relevant data on performances on SAT, ACT, and Advanced Placement tests that presently can only be found there.
As previously noted, the findings of these case studies strongly suggest that, while some inventive systems of reward, encouragement, and reinforcement for high performance are being created in individual high schools, adolescents have little or no incentive to perform well on the CATS tests. School administrators and teachers at every school we examined observed that the CATS tests cannot become a reliable measure of the performance of schools so long as rewards or incentives for high performance are not aimed at students. Because our multiple regression analysis shows that CATS tests performance is significantly related to postsecondary attendance, it is vital that the cognitive skills these tests measure be fully developed.
Principals from these schools suggested the possibility of tying the level of reward from the KEES scholarship program to CATS performance rather than the current link to grade-point averages and performance on the ACT, which encourages grade inflation and, they assert, discourages Advanced Placement course-taking, an important entrée to college. Moreover, linking rewards to performance on the ACT narrows the focus to those who are already college-minded when the potential reward of a larger scholarship linked to test scores might entice more students to become college-minded.
These case studies illustrate the important role that information-sharing can play in improving educational outcomes. Knowledge about what works and about transferable ideas can be key to improving academic and, in turn, postsecondary performance. To that end, part of the framework for achieving long-term education goals in the state should include a routine and formal vehicle for facilitating conversations between educators within districts and regions, and across the state—and beyond—about teaching methods, curriculum, special programs, incentives, etc., that get results. In addition to fostering teamwork within schools, an ongoing dialogue, utilizing e-mail and video-conferencing, as well as routine meetings that feature successful efforts and model practices, could enrich understanding and improve practices statewide.
These case studies suggest that no matter how committed and hard working guidance counselors may be, they often are being stretched far too thinly and assigned too many tasks unrelated to their core mission to perform their jobs effectively. While we undoubtedly have many strong advocates of postsecondary education and training in high schools across the state, advocacy will likely need to become evangelism if we are to raise the percentage of high school graduates in Kentucky who pursue postsecondary education.
Given the state’s high rates of undereducation and poverty and the proven links these demographic factors have to low rates of college attendance as well as the many substantiating observations about the power of local culture heard in interviews for these case studies, we can safely assume that many families lack the resources, cultural or economic, to provide their children informed guidance about postsecondary choices. Unless we make such guidance an integral part of education, at every grade level, only those children fortunate enough to have motivated and motivating parents will pursue postsecondary education options. Indeed, this appears to be the current situation.
In short, unless we adopt a more aggressive posture to encourage young people to pursue postsecondary education and fully inform them about their choices, the ready availability of financial assistance with college costs, the mechanics of applying for college admission and financial aid, and the tangible and intangible benefits of postsecondary education or training, nothing will change. Too many young people interviewed for these case studies still view college as unaffordable, a perception that must be countered at the earliest possible age to deter discouraging academic performance borne of resignation. As it is, peer pressure already depresses academic performance. A consistent, positive, countervailing pressure is needed, and as the special programs we detail demonstrate so successfully, at least part of it can come from successful peers.
Moreover, we cannot expect postsecondary attendance to increase when any high school student can report in her senior year, as one young women did, that no one had ever discussed with her the possibility of going to college. Too many exceptions to the rule that grades and performance on standardized tests dictate postsecondary capabilities can be found among competent professionals in today’s work world. Some of the authors of this report, for example, confess to having been disinterested, largely disengaged high school students who routinely underperformed. To rule out postsecondary options based on high school grades or even standardized test performances, which oftentimes reflect stresses external to the school, seems particularly inappropriate given the circumstances we found in High School D. That students have not risen above the school’s culture, much less their community’s culture, which educators portrayed as an educational wasteland, should not seal their fates.
Research is clearly needed to learn more about what difference trained counselors are making in postsecondary choices and what counseling strategy best works. We found, for example, in our survey of high school students that critical postsecondary choices are being made at an earlier age than it would appear traditional counselors begin to focus on postsecondary choices and plans. It is also important to learn more about the efficacy of teacher-student counseling initiatives like those we found at High Schools A and C, determine what curricula best work and when these efforts should begin. Middle and perhaps even the latter years of grade school may be the most appropriate time.
In the meantime, it is clear that counseling efforts could be improved greatly by permitting counselors to do more of what they are trained to do, rather than blurring their roles and diluting their effectiveness. At the same time, we must raise our expectations of guidance counselors. Policy options include:
Consider establishing a student-to-guidance counselor ratio and a time line for implementation that will permit school districts to plan and budget for the transition;
Shift all unrelated duties such as scheduling, hall monitoring, teaching, and coaching to other personnel;
Train counselors to guide and assist academically troubled students as effectively as they assist the likely college-bound student;
Build on the efforts of High Schools A and C and create a career curriculum that counselors/teachers can use to help young people make more informed postsecondary choices;
Establish counseling goals that must be achieved for students at every year of high school—and, our research suggests, elementary and middle schools—placing special emphasis on entering freshmen and the need to establish learning habits as early as possible that will support and enable academic success; and
Systematically measure a range of outcomes, including among other things, postsecondary attendance rates, timely fulfillment of graduation requirements, college or vocational preparation, and communications with parents. Student and parent assessments of the quality of assistance received from guidance counselors should figure prominently in the evaluation of the effectiveness of these professionals.
We found that the majority of juniors and seniors we interviewed and a significant portion of sophomores and freshmen work extensive hours in paid employment. As a result, many juggle an extraordinarily demanding schedule, the equivalent of two full-time jobs, that leaves them tired, sleepy, and disengaged from the academic and social life of their school. Teachers and other school personnel consistently said they believe the demands of paid employment undermine academic performance and, in some cases, create financial traps that may influence and even dictate postsecondary choices for young people, requiring them to work to meet financial obligations and discouraging them from assuming more debt to pursue postsecondary education. More importantly, students consistently acknowledged that paid employment interferes with their studies. Indeed, when asked if work interfered with their studies, some students laughingly responded, "What studies?"
Ideally, work experience helps cultivate good work habits and financial responsibility, but many teachers saw reason to be alarmed about the other messages that so much work so early in life sends to young people. One counselor expressed the belief that seniors at High School A, most of whom choose to work half a day, were losing important opportunities for maturity and socialization. From unbridled materialism to an inability to delay gratification, most teachers at these schools cited student overwork as an obstacle to achievement, rather than a facilitator.
It also appears that co-op programs with local employers may, in some cases, simply be allowing some seniors who have fulfilled most of their credit requirements—more than half the senior class at High School A—to avoid the demands of further studies. Several educators expressed concern about the value of the co-op experience, which they said too often consisted of fast-food jobs that indirectly sanctioned avoidance of the work of learning, the net effect of not being at school.
Alternatively, cooperative agreements that some of these high schools have with local colleges enable qualifying seniors to begin taking college-level courses when they have fulfilled their course requirements. These arrangements, we believe, are positive steps that encourage college attendance and orient young people to campus life, an important experience for first-generation college students. They are far preferable to permitting young people to leave campus to work in jobs that, from the perspective of job training, cannot be justified.
While it is clear that students will continue to seek employment and employers desire their low-cost services, every step must be taken to ensure compliance with labor laws designed to protect them from the levels of overwork they reported. To do so, it may be necessary for schools to educate parents and students about labor laws and the potential costs and consequences of working long hours. Further, schools should be required to ensure that employment through co-op programs or school-to-work offers meaningful work experience that is linked to career opportunities, rather than conveniences for local employers and disengaged students.
While our survey of high school students found no significant relationship between poor academic performance and overwork, these case studies suggest that an altogether different reality may exist for those who do not go to college. Indeed, paid employment may subtly encourage avoiding preparation for college. Further study is needed to determine the effects of paid employment on the students who most need academic attention, underachievers and at-risk students.
While we cannot prohibit paid employment, schools should be discouraging excessive hours of it by raising the bar for all students, requiring them to fulfill homework assignments and meet academic benchmarks that would permit them to achieve competency. At a minimum, schools—and parents—must ensure that academic competencies and requirements are being met before students are permitted to leave campus for paid employment.
These case studies suggest that the fear many harbor in Kentucky, that is, that young people will continue to leave the state, never to return, may give rise to potentially destructive cultural messages. These messages circumscribe the lives of many young people, limit their exposure to opportunities, and, for some, provide the very impetus that causes them to do what was most feared—leave. Today, for those who never or seldom look beyond the region or even the county where they were born, the economic and social consequences could be devastating. Even a commitment to place must be strengthened by knowledge of the larger economy, the social changes underway, and the myriad ways in which they will inevitably affect all of us, regardless of where we live. Clearly, the larger world has opportunities to offer that we can import to the places where we would, in an ideal world, choose to be. By passively fostering an insular world view, that is, failing to encourage vision beyond one’s own immediate world, we ultimately inhibit the capabilities of young people.
Alternatively, exposure to new ideas, opportunities, and places helps foster the confidence young people need to take on the challenges of education, training, entrepreneurship, and achievement. For youth whose parents are poor or undereducated, exposure to a college campus or a museum or an arts event can open the door to possibilities that would otherwise remain unknown. For every story of the gifted Kentuckians who have left the state for other places that offered them greater opportunity, we have the stories like those of engineer-turned-inventor-entrepreneur and now university president, Lee Todd, world-renowned author Bobbie Ann Mason, software engineer Allen Haas, and literally thousands of other gifted people and accomplished professionals who consciously chose to return to their home state, improve its circumstances, help its economy and its people, and celebrate its culture.
For each of the talented Kentuckians who excelled, each of us has our own stories of classmates who had the ability to achieve considerable success but were subtly trained to believe they could not achieve, they could not "get above their raisin’s." They followed their fathers and mothers into factories, mines, steel mills, department stores, clerical pools, and other places that will never begin to tap their considerable gifts. Similarly, as we found in interviews for these case studies, girls still consistently envision themselves in classically female roles, in professions that have historically been vitally important to society but consistently undervalued. In our lifetimes, hundreds of thousands of similar stories will accumulate in our state. As University of Kentucky President Lee Todd has suggested, the subtle, potentially destructive, and circumscribing cultural messages that discourage achievement must be countered vigorously if we are to lift our state to new economic heights and educate more of our very capable citizens.
Were more of us to adopt a new perspective, one that values knowledge of the world around us, one that celebrates the opportunities we can build by exposing young people to the virtually unlimited possibilities that education and training offer them, more of our best and brightest would likely return to the place that first opened these doors of knowledge for them. Indeed, these case studies suggest that our gravest cultural error here may be that of holding too tightly to what we most want to keep, the promise of our youth.
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College-Going Rates