Area educators attend annual conference
Area teachers, guidance counselors and administrators attended the second annual Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) conference hosted recently at Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus. The conference featured experts from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Educational Laboratory (REL), the Center for the Advancement of STEM Education (CASE), the Intermediate Unit 1 (IU 1) and Penn State Fayette.
Keynote speaker Nicole Farmer Hurd, executive director of the National College Advising Corps, issued five recommendations to help high school students prepare for and take courses they need to be ready for college.
Hurd suggested offering courses and curricula that prepare students for college-level work, implementing a curriculum that prepares all students for college, offer opportunities, like dual enrollment, for college-level work and develop a four-year course plan with each ninth-grader.
Schools should use assessment measures throughout high school to inform students about their proficiency in certain subjects, assist them in overcoming deficiencies as they are identified and create an individualized plan for each student, she said.
She recommended providing mentoring for students, facilitating relationships with peers who plan to attend college and providing hands-on opportunities for students to explore different careers.
“Organize students into cohorts so they push each other to succeed,” she said.
She suggested engaging and assisting students in completing critical steps for college entry, including taking college entrance exams, searching for colleges and submitting college applications, and increasing families’ financial awareness and help students apply for financial aid. She said a large number of students submit incomplete financial aid forms.
“Help them fill out financial aid forms and keep it private so it’s not a barrier for a student to go to college,” she said. “Meet parents where they are at so they feel comfortable and not exposed or vulnerable.”
Hurd admitted that roadblocks exist in meeting these goals and said school guidance counselors play a vital role in preparing students for college. She also said higher education institutions must provide more transparency to help local school officials meet those goals.
“We do not want to undercut students by making them not college-ready in terms of their career,” said Hurd, noting postsecondary education not only means attending a four-year institution, but also could be attending a community college or earning a credential.
“This generation will need to think of college more than those before them. + We want students to be college ready in all forms. Students should be able to matriculate into a two-year university for college without remediation,” said Hurd.
“I’m not saying college is for everyone, but the decision should not be made in 12th grade. Look at it early and take the coursework to prepare. Students need to make the commitment and classes to support (the decision),” she added.
People who sat on a panel to discuss the recommendations talked about the challenges people face in order to prepare students for postsecondary education.
Dr. Nancy J. Priselac, director of the training center for CASE located in Garrett College in McHenry, Md., said students seem less focused, more unaware of their potential as leaders outside of school and less likely to be “pleasure readers” than students were 10 years ago.
Some lack basic computation skills for Algebra, she said, noting that cell phones are a huge problem.
“Do not teach the book. Teach the kids what you want them to know and understand and use multiple resources and techniques to get there,” she advised educators.
Dr. James R. Dowler, a curriculum specialist with the IU 1, said some students are passing state assessments and meeting graduation requirements, but are not academically prepared for college success.
He said 60 percent of students entering college are required to take remediation courses as a condition of their enrollment.
“We need to do something to assess where they are,” Dowler said. “We need to put together a strong program using data and individual learning plans.
“Assessment without action is virtually meaningless,” he added. “You’re taking time from instruction to do assessment. We need to identify deficiencies, notify parents and come up with ways to try to correct the deficiencies.”
A focus of the conference was the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences (IES) What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) practice guide, which Hurd, among other university and research professionals, helped to craft. IES is a research agency of the U.S. Department of Education that coordinates REL efforts.
WWC is designed to connect teachers and administrators with the best research on effective interventions and practices in education as they try to reach the goals set by the No Child Left Behind Act, according to literature on the program.
For more information, visit www.whatworks.ed. gov.