The importance of a high school diploma

According to a report just issued by the Center for Public Education, "school districts should make every effort to help students receive a high school diploma even if it takes longer than four years."

According to the report, late graduates who receive their diploma in more than four years were compared to three other groups: on-time graduates, students who earn a GED and dropouts. As expected on-time graduates had the best outcomes in every aspect of life - not just academic, but work, civic life and even health - but late graduates were a close second ahead of GED and dropouts.

Eight-five percent of late graduates were employed compared to 77% of those who received GEDs and 81% of the dropouts. Late grads were also more likely to be employed full-time and possess a job with full benefits.

The report recommends schools offer a curriculum that adequately prepares middle level students for high school courses, identify struggling students and provide intervention programs as well as providing additional support for low-achieving students in high school.

Fortunately, our middle level students are taught by the same teachers who instruct high school students and these teachers are able to provide a sequential progression which helps students build the skills and abilities needed in high school courses while they are middle level students. This year the District implemented a policy whereby junior high or middle level courses are transcripted and students who do not make adequate progress in the 7th and 8th grade do not automatically move on to the next higher grade. It is certainly important that middle level students be prepared, but we feel it is even more important that elementary students are prepared adequately in the fundamental skills which lead to success in school. Our belief in early success led us to become one of the early school districts in Idaho to adopt the Response to Intervention model.

Genesee School has used the Response to Intervention (RtI) model to provide needed support for struggling students at any grade level. RtI has had a major impact on our school by using a data-based decision-making process. Rather than assume the student has a problem, RtI requires that we look at the instruction, the curriculum and the environment in addition to the student. Parents play an integral part in the decision-making process and students are closely monitored during the intervention to insure it is working as anticipated. We believe that the changes we have adopted as we have implemented RtI have had a major impact on student achievement in our school.

Due to our small size, it is difficult for students to "fall between the cracks" and we have few dropouts. I believe a student has to work harder to fail than to succeed in Genesee. Our teachers go the extra mile to help students by coming in early or staying after school, as needed. This is not to say that the student is not ultimately responsible for his or her own education, but that support is available for those who seek it out.