Literature review of continuation schools serving at-risk students

¶ … Schools & at-Risk Students

Continuation Classes for at-Risk Students

Many students at the high school level today find it a struggle to perform well in the traditional classroom setting. For various and diverse reasons, the traditional school structure does not work well for certain students - some who are at-risk, others who have going foul of the law or have become involved with substance abuse issues, and still others who are plainly ill-suited by nature to conventional structure. In search of a remedy for that situation, school districts across the United States have over the past few decades established "continuation" or "alternative" educational settings. Often these settings provide an independent study format - with support and guidance by qualified teachers and staff - and students attending the continuation schools become recipients of a high school diploma, which is the very minimum requirement in the 21st Century economy.

This paper reviews and examines the history and challenges of continuation school programs, defining and identifying what works, what does not work, and why the continuation concept is appropriate for at-risk youth.

WHAT IS the DEFINITION of an at-RISK STUDENT?

The at-risk student in today's educational environment is one who likely comes from a "dangerous neighborhood," according to an article in the American School Board Journal (Hardy, 2007). Dangerous in this context might mean a high-crime area, or an area heavily influenced by street gang activities. The at-risk student may live though some of the social dangers that are identified with a poverty-ridden environment, where inadequate housing is the norm and poor nutrition and family stress are every day realities. at-risk basically means that there is a risk that the student may potentially drop out of school, or become involved in inappropriate behaviors (illegal drug usage, alcohol abuse, sexual promiscuity, gang violence or psychological problems like depression), and somehow not fit in to the mainstream of student communities. There is an impression - not often true - that continuation schools are places where students who have been kicked out of high schools go because they are incorrigible or on drugs or into violence. That may be true in some cases, but the positive stories of students who are or were caught in tough social and family situations perhaps don't get told often enough.

The article by Hardy zeros in on a successful continuation program in the George Washington Community School in Indianapolis. Even though Hardy admits that "schools alone cannot solve the problems of at-risk children whose families are mired in poverty," he points out that the George Washingtons School has put together a staff of teachers and professionals "that will not accept failure." think if I would have been at a different school, I would have dropped out by now," said Leonardo Salinas, 17 years old, a graduate of George Washington who came to the school as an at-risk student. He came from a low-income family and had dropped out of regular high school so he could work a job that helped support his family. His working hours begin at 3:00 P.M., and go to midnight. "By the time I got home," he told Hardy for the article, "I'm tired. I just want to eat some cereal and go to bed." But having the flexibility to attend the continuation school at hours convenient to his own schedule allowed Salinas to not only get his high school degree, but to finish 10th in a class of 65.

Now, following graduation from George Washington continuation school, Salinas has been offered a $30,000 scholarship and has been accepted at 10 colleges. "They just kept pushing and pushing," Salinas said of his teachers, who motivated him and were persistent with him. And hence, he is no longer at risk.

Another student, Britney Keller, was at-risk and had to drop out of high school to help her mother; her mother suffered an "ectopic pregnancy" and so Britney stayed home to help her mom with the newborn and his 1-year-old brother. "At one point," Britney was quoted as saying in the article, "I even gave up." She was in sixth grade when she had to leave school to help her mom survive. By May 2007, Britney had turned 18 and was a graduate of George Washington with a 3.8 GPA - and she was a member of the National Honor Society.

So one can see there are positive stories associated with at-risk students - that is, when quality continuation programs are in place to assist those students. In the case of Britney, she was raised in a community where only 5% of adults in the surrounding neighborhood have college educations; and moreover, 89% of students at George Washington continuation school qualify for subsidized lunches, and indication of the extreme poverty in the area - and an environment that clearly produces at-risk students looking for an opportunity to raise themselves up out of the legacy of failure.

The National Academic Advising Association (NACADA) explains that at-risk students' "...skills, knowledge, motivation and/or academic ability are significantly below those of the 'typical' student in the...curriculum in which they are enrolled" (Walsh, 2006). In addition, Walsh, of Iowa State University, states that at-risk students are also likely to display characteristics like "...low academic self-concept, unrealistic grade and career expectations..."

Beyond that, at-risk students also are noted for having "...unfocused career objectives, extrinsic motivation, external locus of control. Low self-efficacy, inadequate study skills..." along with a personal history that includes "passive learning" and a misinformed understanding that learning is about memorizing, not solving problems or seeking answers to issues. Moreover, Walsh continues, at-risk students may simply have made poor choices or decisions that had a negative impact on their learning experiences; at-risk students are not necessarily teenagers, either, Walks explains. Indeed they may be adults who are attempting to return to the academic environment after a number of years of absence, and are on shaky ground as to their own self-esteem and belief systems. at-risk students may also be people with physical limitations, or with emotional or academic limitations who are motivated but not sophisticated in the ways and means of learning in a structured situation.

The NACADA report suggests that when at-risk students attend continuation schools, there should be "specially designed courses" for them which focus on "critical thinking skills," a strategy for evaluating personal and academic goals, and a strategy (uniquely drawn up for each specific individual) to meet those goals.

HISTORY of CONTINUATION SCHOOLS

The independent study format, known most often as "continuation" school, has been in place in the Arlington, Virginia public school system since 1929, to one degree or another. According to the Arlington Public Schools Web pages, students in the High School Continuation Program are ultimately responsible for the same course requirements - numbers of credits and standards of learning (SOL) assessment verification - as the students in the "comprehensive high schools" (www.apsva.us/hsc).

The Arlington school officials believe that "given appropriate supports and opportunities," all students have the ability to learn. Some students "learn differently," however, yet they still yearn to succeed. And hence, in the Arlington continuation setting over the past 78 years, including the continuations schools "Arlington Mill" and "Langston," students have been offered a chance to gain six to seven credits per year in a "flexible" setting. The Arlington school district calls their continuation program a "Small and caring learning community" that provides a "safety net for students who face challenges completing their education." It is also a "gateway" for those students who have dropped out or been shown the door - for any reason - to return to the conventional school setting. "Balancing life's demands" for a teenager can be troublesome and intimidating, the Arlington school authorities explain, and hence for some teens, continuation school is a wonderful opportunity.

There are some requirements that have been set up by Arlington's continuation programs: students must be 16 years of age; they must pay a certain minimum fee to enroll; they may be referred by the school, by themselves, or by the courts.

While Virginia's continuation program dates back to 1929, the program of continuation education in California dates back to 1919, according to an article in Introduction to Continuation Education. There are over 550 continuation schools in California, according to the article, and the enrollment of students in continuation high schools adds up to about 10% of all California high school students.

In California, continuation programs are limited to schools with large populations, and they provide a "broad-based curriculum" which includes "personalized instruction; a work-study program; and intensive counseling, guidance, placement, and follow-up services." Beyond just getting a diploma, the California continuation education program strives to have students become "...productive persons," to give them a feeling of "self-worth, self-confidence, and personal satisfaction." Also, the article expresses the need for continuation graduates to develop a "tolerance and understanding" of a diversity of ideas and attitudes outside of their own.

Back in 1919, there were only four California school districts that had a continuation program, but by 1965, changes in the education codes and "family instability and dysfunction" led more and more districts to adopt continuation school programs. The author of the article, "Achieving the Challenge: Meeting Standards in the Continuation High School" (Stits, 2001) related that "prior to 1983, many continuation high schools existed in districts where expectations were limited to keeping the students in school as much as possible," and also the ideas was to keep those continuation students "away from the traditional high school campus." The implication was clear: there was a stigma that students in continuation school were bad seeds, and the idea was to keep them away from the mainstream lest they have a negative effect on the "good students" in the regular high school.

But eventually, the image of continuations schools in California changed, as communities more and more were trying to prevent school dropouts, and the need for a high school diploma became more important, as well, Stits writes.

HOW DO CONTINUATION SCHOOLS OPERATE?

In an article in the journal Thrust for Educational Leadership (Necochea, et al., 1996), the authors explain that some school districts incorporate "eclecticism" into the fabric of their continuation programs. That means doing what other traditional schools can't or won't do; it also means using creative curriculum designs that offer incentives to continuation students to succeed in their education endeavors.

A few of the creative approaches that teachers offer include: a) students can establish their own time-lines to complete assignments (with teachers signing off on the departure from regular time lines); b) students work within a "credit accrual" system (students can complete credits as quickly or as slowly as they wish, depending on their motivation for learning); c) "modified attendance procedures" result in fewer "punitive measures" applied for absenteeism and a more open-minded approach to encouraging constructive attendance; d) since traditional instructional practices are frequently ineffective for at-risk students, teachers and staff work to create fresh strategies such as "hands-on" instructions, "visuals and manipulatives" and "cooperative learning groups." This last example is made possible by the fact that there are reduced class sizes in most continuation schools, which allow teachers to work with students one-on-one in a "hands-on" format. This is also a way to attract teachers to continuation programs, as it is a fact that in many conventional high school settings, classrooms are overcrowded and teachers don't have the chance to work with students one-on-one very often.

The authors of this article also point out that "team-building" among teachers and staff members is a collaborative and supportive strategy in terms of presenting a viable, interesting program for at-risk students. The authors suggest that teachers and administrative leaders at continuations schools - through team building - "tend to" to the following: "encourage and support innovations"; "offer protection from the greater social system"; build a strong "rapport" with students; and also "coordinate the efforts of outside agencies." Through these team-building strategies, the authors continue, a climate of "experimentation" is fostered, and that climate can (and often does) include reaching out into the community to tap into existing resources that perhaps the conventional schools have not done.

Also, teambuilding tends to engender a policy within staff that the authors term "agree to disagree" on a private, professional level. Indeed, diverse opinions and "open communication" are valued policies in successful continuation schools. Moreover, diversity among the teaching staff in continuations contributes to the effectiveness of the program. Another dynamic that the authors of this article mention is the fact that the continuation school must be prepared to respond positively to the "misunderstanding and suspicions" that arise from the community. Especially during times of tight budgets and "declining resources." The team of teachers and staff members working in continuation programs need to "proactively build acceptance, tolerance and celebration" for the successes - albeit they may be small - that at-risk students experience.

An article in the journal Preventing School Failure (Quinn, et al., 2006) has a somewhat different thrust than previous articles mentioned in this review of the literature. Indeed, this scholarly article asserts that while there has been "a tremendous growth" in the availability of alternative educational programs for at-risk young people, there is "little empirical evidence" available today to actually identify the various components that are required to build effective continuation programs. And so the authors present studies of alternative school programs in order to offer some data and information that can be used by educators in building better continuation programs.

The article begins by presenting the possible reasons why so many young people struggle in traditional school settings. One possible reason - presented by scholar and researcher Nicholas Hobbs - is that the emotional problems many children go through are symptoms of "...a malfunctioning ecosystem" rather than any kind of "individual pathology." Hence, when a child fails, or becomes at risk, it is incumbent on the society to not only work with the child, but to "change the system in order to facilitate their growth in areas of competence, independence, responsibility, and self-respect."

Another reason so many students fail to adjust to traditional schools is not the fault of the system, but is the fault of the student. Many young people who end up in continuation or alternative schools display behaviors that are, according to the authors' research, "cynical." These cynical students posses "antisocial attitudes and behaviors" and they have no idea how to strategize educational or career goals; moreover they suffer from behavioral traits that are a result of bad influences from peer groups they themselves have chosen and from whom they apparently have no desire to escape.

Whether true or not, each of these explanations are just that, projected explanations and not a resolution of real educational problems and issues. Meanwhile, the article points to the history of alternative schools dating back to 1921 in England, when the private residential facility known as "Summerhill" was established by innovative educator a.S. Neill. Summerhill became a movement after gaining respect and popularity in Europe and in the U.S.; the administrators and teachers in those schools believed that "traditional schools confined students and did not respect the personal freedom that students needed in order to learn," according to the article. There was also a movement called the "freedom school" movement, which was launched in the American south. This movement was based on the fact that "traditional schools were not appropriate for African-American students" simply because those traditional schools were designed to produce "subjects, not citizens."

While neither of those approaches has caught on with any degree of popularity with school administrators or parents, they both did emphasize innovations not found in traditional schools. And they led to basically three types of alternative or continuation schools: Type I: schools that students (with the consent of their parents) choose to attend because they place emphasis on innovative programs and strategies; Type II: schools that are known as "last chance schools" that students are usually sent to rather than be expelled permanently from conventional schools; and Type III: schools that are "remedial and therapeutic in nature."

There is a need - the authors suggest - to restructure alternative schools and in the meantime there is also a need to rethink how school districts should approach this restructuring. The authors present three scenarios: one, "change the student" (fix the student by offering temporary assignments "that are highly structured" and contain "therapeutic components"); two, "change the school" (build schools with very positive climates that emphasize innovative curriculum and instructional approaches); and three, "Change the educational system" (offer alternative schools that are more progressive and more responsive to students than many of today's continuation schools, which have a reputation as a dumping grounds for incorrigible youth).

All that having been said, the authors go into great detail as to methods of putting the three scenarios into place in American communities, which makes interesting reading for teachers and others interested in improving educational opportunities for young people.

Community College Week (March, 2004) reports that in Rhode Island, the state department of education has put into effect an innovative and experimental program that blends high school and college courses "...and is designed for students who are in danger of dropping out." The concept is called "middle college" receive their high school diplomas after five years, rather than the traditional four years. Why? Administrators contend that extra year "gives at-risk students extra preparation for college as well as confidence to pursue an advanced degree."

Robert Pilkington, among the leaders of the middle college ("Textron Chamber of Commerce Academy") in Providence, RI, said that the middle college concept was launched because "...there aren't any school structures that allow a [high school] senior to move seamlessly into college." The way it works is that students enter middle college at the start of their junior year in high school; at that time they take a combination of high school and college courses, and three years later they graduate. Once they graduate from the middle college, and finish the requirements for college, they can apply the credits they earned at the middle college to community colleges or four-year schools. The concept is partly intended in order for a student to have improved self-esteem. Having already successfully passed some college courses, a student would then feel more comfortable making the transition to a college or university.

The Providence, Rhode Island middle college isn't the first such institution; the article points out that the first middle college opened in 1974 at LaGuardia Community College in New York. There are over 30 such schools now in the United States; and the point here is not to replace continuation schools with middle colleges at all, but rather, to offer that opportunity for students who may be struggling in high school with self-esteem and other problems but would be encouraged about their future careers to be in an advanced program that wasn't necessarily any more difficult academically or intellectually than regular high school. "Middle colleges give struggling students the opportunity to tackle college-level work while making sure they get the remedial help they need," the article concludes.

The student in a middle college environment would be in most cases required to take at least one college-level course per semester, but the class is normally offered in the afternoon or the evening, so that student can continue his or her regular high school experience.

Meantime, turning the attention to an alternative school teacher, the question posed in an article in the journal Educational Leadership (Varlas, 2007) is this: "Why would Joris Ray, starting out as an ambitious first-year teacher in Memphis City Public Schools, choose to work a second shift in an alternative school?" Ray, who was chosen as ASCD's "Outstanding Young Educator" in 2006, says he originally never thought of teaching at risk kids, but when offered a chance to coach a youth basketball team, he discovered the "satisfaction of working with at-risk students." He saw his players "grow and succeed" and realized he needed to be there for them in ways beyond sports. So he became a continuation school teacher and helped raise the self-esteem of students just like he did with his basketball players. "Once you get students seeing beyond today, they tend to make better choices." Those students that are motivated to see the future instead of their problems right now and today "...know that every step they take is going to hinder their progress or propel them further," Ray stated in the article about Memphis Alternative Schools.

But that's just the beginning of Ray's story. Today, Ray is ten years into his employment in Memphis, and he is Director of Alternative Schools and Programs for Memphis City Schools. He leads the district's efforts to serve "...disruptive and at-risk youth who have been unable to succeed in traditional schools." Ray has a three-fold approach to his job; one, he emphasizes hiring and training "highly qualified teachers and staff" who get involved with parents and caregivers in a meaningful way; two, he builds support in the community "...through a strong service learning component"; and three, he emphasizes the need to set high expectations for students in continuation / alternative schools, and uses "proactive prevention models" in order to intervene early when there is a potential problem with an individual student.

Ray says - and this is good advice for present and future teachers who have ambitions to get involved with continuation schools - that his core philosophy is "...successful academics change behavior." it's the mission of this Memphis continuation leader: "Every child, every day, college bound." Meanwhile, as an executive in the school district, Ray used his creative and communication skills and went on radio and cable TV stations "to recruit teachers to come to Memphis City Public Schools and work with at-risk youth," the article continues.

Very soon, after Ray used those communication skills, "more than 500 educators from across the United States were standing in line to teach in alternative schools," the writer explains. Ray says, "There used to be a time when at-risk settings drew teachers who didn't want to teach and students who didn't want to learn." But those days in Memphis are "long gone, the writer goes on. Ray witnesses the passion and the hard work of the teachers he has recruited in Memphis, and he tells the reporter for this story that it is not just about working for alternative schools, but it is also about serving - and developing - stakeholders in the "future of the Memphis community." Ray also knows how to raise money for the program; he has received more than $250,000 in state and federal grants in the past few years, and is proud of that fact.