March 8, 2006

Homework: Get Accepted to College

When students at San Marcos High School cross the stage at graduation they get two pieces of paper: a San Marcos diploma and their acceptance letter to Austin Community College.

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On the far side of the stage, each proud graduate is greeted by an equally proud Mary Hensley, ACC’s vice president for college support systems and independent school district relations. A few years ago, Hensley and Sylvester J. Perez, superintendent of the San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District, were brainstorming for a way to help San Marcos to do its part for Closing the Gaps, an ambitious initiative in Texas that seeks to increase by over 600,000 — to over 1.5 million — the number of students in Texas colleges and universities by 2015.

They came up with an idea so brilliantly simple, Hensley’s wondered ever since how someone didn’t come up with it earlier: as a requirement of graduation, all San Marcos students — 64 percent of whom are Hispanic — would have to be accepted to Austin Community College. In a single school year – 2004-5 – the percentage of students at San Marcos, a school of about 2,000, who went on to Texas institutions, jumped 11 points, to 45 percent. A major goal of the Closing the Gaps initiative is to increase the number of minority students going to college. By 2008, Hispanics are projected to account for over 40 perecent of the Texas population, and their college-going rate has lagged behind that of white students. That 11 percentage point jump has made Hensley — who pledges to return all calls in 30 minutes — a popular woman. The College Connection program has already been adopted in eight school districts that ACC serves, including the Austin Independent School District, with more on the way.

Deborah Santiago, vice president for policy and research at Excelencia in Education, a group that promotes ways to increase Latino college success, said that three main hurdles block otherwise qualified students from going to college. “If they jump through these hoops,” she said, “their chance of going to college is incredibly high.” Hurdle one: the application.

When the program began in the spring of 2002, it was without any grants or additional resources, so, again, a simple solution was the only option. Admissions staff and advisers from ACC jump in their cars and take their work to the high school. Every senior at San Marcos is taken out of English class to meet with the college staff members, who talk to the students about things like the increased earning potential of a college graduate. “They’ll say, ‘maybe you can get this kind of car with a high school diploma, and this other one with a B.A.,’” according to Cecily Moore, San Marcos High’s advanced academics coordinator. After a bit of advising and discussion of majors, the students head for the 60 computers in the library to fill out ACC’s online application. Hurdle one cleared.

Even with the application done, some students have no plans to take the SAT or ACT, the second major hurdle, according to Santiago. So Hensley and ACC staff members take the test to them. “I took a team of assessment staff down from ACC to San Marcos, and every child who had not already passed an exam, we came in and tested them, free of charge,” she said. ACC administers two tests, ASSET and COMPASS, run by ACT, which are accepted at ACC and some other Texas institutions in lieu of the SAT or ACT. Hurdle two cleared.

The last and most imposing hurdle is applying for financial aid. “That’s absolutely critical,” Santiago said, “especially for first generation students. It’s requesting a lot of information that the child has rarely or never seen. And the onus is often on the student.” ACC sends not only financial aid staff members to San Marcos, but tax consultants from the area have volunteered time to help students navigate the fine print. Some parents “are hesitant to send [financial] information in the kid’s backpack to school,” Moore said, so there’s also a weekend session for parents who want to join but can’t make it in the middle of the school day.

Chad Kelly, the principal of San Marcos High School, insists that all families, from wealthy to undocumented, go through the entire process. Kelly said there are periodic grumbles from students who already have solid plans. “You never know what’s going to happen,” he said. “That’s how we sell it. If you want to come home and take a summer course [at ACC], you’re already accepted. You just have to call up and register.”

Hensley now has a waiting list of districts and community colleges hoping to use her expertise. At least five other community colleges, including the Houston Community College System and the Houston Independent School District — have started or are hoping to start their own College Connection. Del Mar College in Corpus Christi, Temple College in Temple, and Coastal Bend College in Beeville have all started a College Connection program and local high schools have begun to adapt the application requirement. Individualized College Connection information for all 28 high schools that work with ACC is available online. And word is still travelling fast. In October 2005, ACC did a local cable television broadcast where staff members, administrators, and students answered questions about going to college from high school students.

With College Connection — the name Hensley came up with when she realized the program was “here to stay,” she said – spreading across Texas like wildfire, the next challenge, Perez said, is to improve retention and graduation rates. To that end, ACC is offering classes, often at a high school, that give students both high school and college credits. Perez hopes to add one more accolade for students who get their diploma and acceptance letter at graduation. “Why can’t they leave with one or two years of college credit too?” Perez asked.

— David Epstein

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Comments

“Brilliantly simple"?

As a professor at a community college, I see several serious issues with this policy:1) Unless students are required to attend high school until they graduate, how does this help students, minority or otherwise, who drop out of high school? Has anyone checked dropout rates at San Marcos to determine whether more students have dropped out of high school since the policy took effect? If so, to what extent might the dropout rate be seen as an effect of that policy?

2) Not everyone can has the intellectual ability to handle post-secondary learning; I’ve had many students in my classes who just cannot understand concepts, no matter how much I, they, tutors, etc. try. These students experience little more than extreme frustration and perhaps serious damage to self-image. Why should someone for whom high school education was too challenging be forced to try it at an even more advanced level?

3) This requirement that benefits only one institution of higher learning can so easily be seen as self-interested strong-arming on the part of the community college.

CJO, at 8:10 am EST on March 8, 2006

Re: CJO

Your first question has definite merit; perhaps TX or ACC could respond. In response to your second statement, however, I didn’t read this as requiring students take any collegiate-level courses, merely requiring them to complete the application process for ACC. It seems similar to an economics or business course project where students research job markets and fill out job applications and resumes as part of their assignments. On your third point, I see ACC as merely a starting point — they merely came up with the idea first. There is nothing to block other institutions from partnering with school districts, including San Marcos, in a similar project.

leev, at 8:40 am EST on March 8, 2006

The thought of how many students may never find out how much financial aid they can qualify for causes me much angst. It seems to me having students complete the application to a local community college will open more doors than it closes.

It has the affect of giving them more choices than they might have found for themselves. I think it’s a great concept.

I agree — perhaps the list of participating institutions should be broadened and perhaps an acceptance letter from anywhere, along with a financial aid award letter from anywhere, should meet the requirement. After all, a minority of students know they’re going a different place than the local community college.

The idea is terrific and I hope it affects college going rates favorably.

JP, at 8:55 am EST on March 8, 2006

a culture of learning

Hmmm. I think I’m with CJO here. I think what’s assumed when there are disparaties between groups (say, that Hispanics are under-represented in higher education, or that women are under-represented in physics) is that the cause is discrimination and prejudice.

But, disparaties themselves are not evidence of this. One aspect that is often overlooked is the attitudes towards learning and education that are inherent to a given culture or subculture.

As an excercise in practical problem-solving (I’ve heard of requiring high school students to complete tax forms for a hypothetical family of four) this is a great idea. But, it ignores the underlying issues that 1) lead to discrepancies in enrollment rates; and 2) often lead to disparities in performance, sometimes resulting in a lowering of expectations on the part of instructors of higher education (the WRONG result!).

The issue that needs resolving is that attitudes toward learning, wherever that learning takes place. We don’t need a society of 100% college graduation. What we need is a society of intelligent, capable, and involved citizens. The two goals are different.

ArticulateDad, at 10:25 am EST on March 8, 2006

What is Articulate Dad implying?

Important news, great comments, but when Articulate Dad blames Hispanic cultural attitudes, I feel uneasy. Studies by the Pew Center, Public Agenda, and others show that Hispanic families are MOST likely to want college for their children.

Alison, freelance journalist, at 11:10 am EST on March 8, 2006

First-Timers

I wish my school had had this option when I was in high school. No one in my family had ever been to college, and my parents were afraid to provide personal financial information when it came time to think about college. I didn’t get around to postsecondary education until I was in my thirties.

Sheryl, at 11:55 am EST on March 8, 2006

Sheryl,

How would your parents, who were afraid to reveal their financial information, have reacted if they’d been told that unless they did so, you wouldn’t have been able to graduate from high school? Wouldn’t they have felt unreasonably forced, controlled? So, had that option been available, do you think you would have necessarily been able to pursue higher education any earlier than you did—if you ended up pursuing it all?

CJO, at 12:40 pm EST on March 8, 2006

Reading too much

Alison,

I think you’re reading too much into things, and missing your own assumptions. First off, no one (certainly not me) is implying there is anything inherently lacking in the intellect of Hispanics or anyone else. I didn’t, nor did I intend, to “blame Hispanic cultural attitudes” for anything. Those were your words, not mine.

But you write: Hispanic families are MOST likely to want college for their children. Indeed. I haven’t read that study, but I’ll take your word for it. Yet, wanting college is not the same as wanting education.

I’m not speaking of any particular group here. I have no intention to engage in any form of prejudice. I merely seek acknowledgement for differences in cultural attitudes, perhaps I should say ndividual attitudes, to make it more clear. But statistics show us aggregates, group trends.

All I wish to point out is that beefing up enrollment is not the same as addressing deep-seated disparities in society. It is the latter problem that most needs resolution! And unfortunately, these deeper problems are what are most often ignored.

ArticulateDad, at 1:10 pm EST on March 8, 2006

Can’t agree with the spirit of this at all. The high school folks simply need to do a better job— and this seems like a gimmick, not anything of substance.

The fact is that college (even four year college) is getting to be a mediocre experience because of what almost amounts to open admissions policies. It really isn’t that the teaching is all that bad. It’s really that fewer and fewer students are equipped to undergo the experience in a meaningful way. This resets college classes as what might be called “convoy speed.”

So we see constant gimmicking of college too. Powerpoint, etc. Group teaching. The “mediatizing” of classrooms. All of this takes away from teaching a reasonable amount of content—and the emphasis on standardized multiple choice tests doesn’t really speak to the students’ reasoning and writing skills.

Colleges driven by enrollment numbers will gradually tend toward open admissions and drift toward appealing but not especially academic environments.

Henry Vandenburgh, at 4:50 pm EST on March 8, 2006

college acceptance

It’s a great idea because it tells all students that they can go to college if they wish to do so. This sets going to college as an opportunity that may not otherwise cross their minds. They have a place to go, a way to gain marketable skills, a place to belong with people who want them to succeed. What more could one ask? It’s brilliant!

zoom, at 11:40 am EST on March 9, 2006

a good idea

I think people are worrying too much.

Austin Community College is not going to lower its standards because enrollment increases. Unless things are vastly different in Texas, where I have taught, community colleges are open admissions: you graduate HS or get a GED, and you’re in, baby, if you want to be. Like it or not, those students are entitled to be accepted. (Whether people should need higher degrees to be plumbers and secretaries is ANOTHER topic for another day.)

Now, will faculty have to adjust if the population at a college drastically changes? Yes, and if this is happening, then there’s room for what we used to call “remedial” classes. I am not for dumbing down education. Frankly, students who aren’t ready for college may also learn this by taking a class in one.

Forcing students to take some kind of admissions test AND forcing parents to fill out those financial aid forms (not an empty exercise: the student really is applying to a college) are exercises which give the students REAL opportunities. And I think even the minority who are destined for higher things should STILL apply to Austin CC. After all, emergencies happen. I’ve known kids whose college plans were dashed when parents’ finances broke down, when someone died, when the kid had a medical problem, etc. during the summer before college. This way, education does not have to be interrupted in such cases. It’s a great idea.

kate, big east coast urban U, at 3:05 pm EST on March 14, 2006

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Homework: Get Accepted to College

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Comments

“Brilliantly simple"?

Re: CJO

a culture of learning

What is Articulate Dad implying?

First-Timers

Reading too much

college acceptance

a good idea

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