September 19, 2011
Announcing the 2012 Call for Proposals
The focus areas for our 2012 Community Grants are
- enhancing college readiness for low-income middle and high school students, and
- increasing the number of low-income students who successfully complete their degree programs.
Grant funds can be used to generate new knowledge about what works in college readiness and degree completion or to build the capacity of programs, organizations, or coalitions.
Webinar information sessions about the application process will be held on September 27 and 28, and the Letter of Interest must be completed online by October 17.
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Achieving the Dream: Intervention Explorer Achieving the Dream (ATD) is a national initiative to help more community colleges students succeed, particularly low-income students and students of color. Six ATD colleges in Washington have spent more than five years building a culture of evidence and inquiry, examining student data, implementing strategies to close achievement gaps, evaluating the strategies, and institutionalizing those strategies that have the greatest impact.
Intervention Explorer is a new web-based, searchable tool that summarizes the most successful strategies of the six ATD colleges. Users can search by college or strategy. Collectively, these strategies are moving the needle on student success. |
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Assessing a College-going Mindset Research shows that academic performance is the strongest predictor of college readiness and success, and programs that increase students' knowledge of college and careers and improve students' college-going mindset have a positive impact on academic performance. Want to assess your students' college-going mindset? Measuring student gains in this area can help demonstrate program impact and give you valuable information to help you improve your program. Assessment tools are available on the Washington College Access Network and College Spark Washington websites. |
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Engaging Faculty
Engaging Adjunct and Full-Time Faculty in Student Success Innovation is a new report from Achieving the Dream (ATD) and Public Agenda to help colleges design and implement effective faculty engagement strategies on behalf of institutional change for student success. Section 1, comprised of principles and practices, helps colleges make strategic decisions about when and how to most constructively engage faculty as partners in the difficult work of institutional change. Section 2 offers mini-cases of faculty engagement at colleges participating in ATD. Section 3 includes a list of resources -- research, conference presentations, and additional case studies. |
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The Data Drive in Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce School District, a College Spark Washington grantee, was recently highlighted in the Lumina Foundation's national publication, Focus, for its leadership in using data to improve student success.
After tracking first semester freshmen failure rates, the district learned that more than one out of three freshmen was failing English. The same was true in algebra and science. Franklin Pierce district leadership responded by developing a Freshman Success Program in English, math, and science. Six years later, the district is seeing a dramatic decline in freshmen first semester failure rates. At Washington High School, the failure rate decreased by 33 percent in English, by 26 percent in science, and by 26 percent in algebra. Similar success can be found at Franklin Pierce High School.
The Freshman Success Program requires students who miss more than two assignments to attend a 45-minute study hall prior to lunch focused on the core content area of the missing assignment. Students who complete the missing assignments are excused to lunch; those who don't are brought lunch and required to stay and complete the work. According to Assistant Superintendent Tim Stensager, in addition to the dramatic decreases in failure rates, there have been significant increases in attendance rates and the district has the lowest suspension rates on record. "With 15, instead of 130, kids failing, the counseling staff can dig-in, examine the underlying issues facing each student, and develop an individualized plan of support" says Tim. |
