In The News
YES WE CAN!
By Tobi Kibel Piatek | Wednesday, November 5th, 2008
No matter what your political affliation, I hope you will agree that last night was an inspiring one. I was thrilled by the long lines of voters, the huge crowds, the tears, the cheers, the geniuine excitement and air of hope and promise. For the first time in a long time (at least for me), election night feels like a new beginning. With all the news and all the issues, I want to point to a little article in today’s Oregonian that offers good news to OUR kids - kids at risk.
Portland’s voters give kids five more years of services
The children’s levy will pay for early education, mentoring and child abuse prevention
Portland voters overwhelmingly renewed a five-year property tax levy that pays for grants to nonprofit organizations that provide early-childhood education, after-school care and mentoring programs. The levy also will pay for services for foster children for the first time.
The levy was passing 70 percent to 30 percent in partial returns.
“I think Portland voters have proven that although these are tough times and concerns about jobs and mortgage payments are on people’s minds, I think they recognize a good long-term investment in the city’s kids,” said City Commissioner Dan Saltzman, who spearheaded the levy and leads a committee that approves the grants.
My question: In what ways will this money be spent? Is your organization waiting for dollars to fund specific projects or services? Please share stories about the impact these dollars can make for the kids you work with. Click COMMENT below to respond.
Topics: In The News | 1 Comment »
After-school success began with Mrs. B. (and Everybody Benefits)
By Tobi Kibel Piatek | Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008
There was a great column by Andy Parker in today’s Metro Section. Parker writes about a mentoring program that has been making a profound difference in the lives of Clackamas County kids and families by offering after-school, summer and language programs to hundreds of families. Part of what makes this program work is the high school students that drop in one or twice a week to work with kids.
I am always on the lookout for stories that show how, when schools, families and the community work together, everybody benefits, and this story came with its own statistics. “The result, (of the afterschool mentoring program) measured by Portland State University, shows higher attendance, fewer behavior problems and rising academic performance for a majority of the 100 or so kids in the Lot Whitcomb program every year.”
The program, begun years ago, at a school “long considered Clackamas County’s poorest elementary school,” has been so successful, that the program is now expanding to four more schools in the North Clackamas School District. In fact, “on Tuesday, Susan Castillo, Oregon schools superintendent, came … to tell the educators and nonprofit leaders (who fund and run this program) they’d been chosen as one of seven outstanding school/community partnerships in the state.”“It proves,” said school counselor Ellen Baltus, who “has been running this program for years now”, “what can happen when we all just do our part. Everybody does a little bit, and it works.” Or, said another way, everybody benefits.
Topics: Community Service, Creating a Positive, In The News | No Comments »
Resources address the Dropout Rate
By Tobi Kibel Piatek | Tuesday, September 30th, 2008
As new students begin the course this month, their first task is to consider the question: Who Drops Out and Why? These are some additional resources, ideas and information that will add value to the first lessons.
The rising dropout rate around the country is getting more attention – now considered, at least by the FOX News Channel, one of “the challenges facing the country in the 21st century.”
This article, Educators Alarmed by High Dropout Rates Among Teens is one of a series FOX news is airing on issues facing
One-Third of a Nation: Rising Dropout Rates and Declining Opportunities is an in depth report by the Policy Information Center, Educational Testing Service in Princeton, N.J., “about high—and rising—high school dropout rates, some ways schools are trying to retain students, the limited—and diminishing—supported opportunities for dropouts to regain a footing in education and training, and the increasingly dire prospects for dropouts in today’s economy.”
Topics: Drop Out Rate, In The News, RESOURCES | 1 Comment »
What about the third R – Relationships?
By Tobi Kibel Piatek | Monday, June 9th, 2008
June 9, 2008
In this morning’s Oregonian, the opinion column is titled, Putting our money where our kids are (reducing the dropout rate). Click here to read the entire column. The column is in response to an earlier editorial Putting schools on the spot
Both editorials contain advice and opinions about Oregon’s startling dropout rate (43% according to Portland Mayor-elect Sam Adams).
Today’s column, by Scott Eave, vice president for human resources at Gunderson Inc., cites “The Silent Epidemic,” a 2006 report for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, “which interviewed high school dropouts, (and found that) … more than 80 percent of the students surveyed indicated that teaching and curriculum needed to be improved to make school more relevant and engaging , and (that schools need to ) enhance the connection between school and work.” The author also points out that in 2005; the Portland school board adopted more rigorous graduation requirements with the goal of ensuring that students are better prepared for life and work after high school.
Rigor and relevance, clearly essential goals for our education system, but in my opinion, these columns, and so many other articles I read about our drop out epidemic, fail to address the third (and most important) R … relationships.
In the process of developing this course (ABOUT Making Connections), extensive research demonstrated that a significant part of students’ success is directly linked to having a one-on-one relationship with an adult who truly cares about what happens to them. And yet, so little is written about this essential element in the life of a kids at risk.
There is no question that kids need (deserve) opportunities to engage in experiences that demonstrate the relevance of what they are learning to their real lives. They also deserve to leave school with the skills and knowledge they will need for continuing their educations, and with the ability to find and fill jobs in the workplace. But, for so many of our kids at risk of dropping out, before rigor and relevance can shape their future, they need to feel comfortable, able to learn, welcome, and safe in our schools and classrooms. In other words, they need relationships.
Only when this need is met can they move on to the next steps on their ladders to success.
Tell Us: What do you think? Are relationships more important than rigor and relevance? What do you believe is the key to keeping kids in school? What works for your kids? What does not?
Click the No Comment button to add a your thoughts.
Topics: Dropouts, In The News | No Comments »
Oregon Dropout Rate Climbs
By Tobi Kibel Piatek | Thursday, April 10th, 2008
This morning’s Oregonian headline reads Oregon Dropout Rate Climbs. The article states that 8338 students quit school last year before graduating. 8338 students! No matter how you look at that number, that’s a lot of drop outs. Taking this idea further – if 8338 dropped out, how many more are at risk of doing so in the near future?
So, what can we do about it? The Oregonian article did have some answers. If you are on this site, you probably have a major clue to at least one solution, but its nice to see that we have the right idea when we point out that the most important thing we can do to help keep kids in school is as simple as this - make connections, reach out, build relationships.
This clearly works at Century High School in Hillsboro. Century has an 80% Latino population, “the ethnic group with the highest dropout rate”, but this school’s drop out rate is only 1%! So how do they do it?
Primary among the things that adults at the school do is “monitor teens constantly and step in within days when a student skips school or shows other warning signs.” Administrators and counselors reach out to kids, ask how they can help, offer counseling about the future, find ways to settle conflicts. In other words – they form and maintain relationships with students.
They also reach out to families, offer help to depressed teens, provide reading help, and make it easy for students to catch up on credits.
To read this article, Oregon high school dropout rate increased in 2007
For the latest Oregon Graduation Rate by Group statistics (just what you need to know in Lesson One) click here
To read Portland schools among the worst with dropout rates.
Let’s start talking about this.
In your opinion, and based on your experiences, what do YOU think will help reduce the drop out rate in your school, program or district. Share your stories and your ideas.
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Topics: Dropouts, In The News | No Comments »