Cathy Turner Academy facilitator, Central High School

In 2001 Hamilton County high schools were challenged to think 'out of the box' to reform our schools. With the support of a five-year, $8 million Carnegie Corp. grant and with a promise by the Public Education Foundation to raise an additional $6 million, 17 high school teams set out to do just that. Four years later, Hamilton County is recognized around the nation as a leader in high school reform. This road to restructuring has been challenging and rewarding, and has produced improvement in academic achievement, attendance, discipline and teaching, the real benchmarks of effective reform.

Challenged by the business community and institutes of higher education to better prepare students for employment and postsecondary study, we realized that we must change the way we educate. Over the past 30 years, the world around us has changed, including the way we communicate, bank, shop and travel. Unfortunately, the way we taught had not changed, so we were not preparing our students for the ever-changing, technology-based, fast-paced world. This realization propelled us into moving purposefully toward reform.

After analyzing data and completing research, each school wrote a vision statement and then developed a plan to achieve it. We received input from students, parents, community members and teachers. Next, we developed a plan centered on four goals: personalization, curriculum, flexibility and professional development. Each school was given freedom to create an individualized plan to improve student achievement, yet held accountable for showing marked improvement.

As a member of the grant-writing team and the change coach for Central High School, I’ve been part of the process from concept to implementation. A look at key initiatives brought about by the Carnegie/PEF grant shows encouraging results.

Ninth grade: Schools were asked to place great emphasis on transitioning students from middle school to high school. Central’s Ninth Grade Academy establishes a plan for success for all ninth-graders. It includes ongoing intervention for at-risk students, personalization activities, attendance emphasis, relevant instructional strategies and a transition program. In its first year of implementation in 2002, the 10th-grade promotion rate increased 12 percent, the suspension rate fell 12 percent, and the attendance rate increased 1 percent. Brainerd High and Soddy-Daisy High are seeing similarly encouraging results.

Career academies: Each high school is expected to offer at least one career academy. After extensive research, site visits, conferences and intensive staff development, Central High has moved from a traditional high school to one composed of four academies: Ninth Grade Academy; Humanities, Fine Arts, & Communications Academy; Math, Technology, & Science Academy; and Technology, Communications, & Business Academy. Students get the benefit of a college-preparatory curriculum with a career-related theme. They are given work-based learning opportunities provided by local employers, and their teachers create opportunities for personalization through increased attention to grades, attendance and personal needs.    In the first year of full implementation, we have seen a drop in suspensions from 343 in the first semester of 2004 to 142 in the first semester of 2005. Career academies in other schools are also seeing gains. An average of 87 percent of the students in Red Bank High School’s two career academies passed all courses. East Ridge High School’s Career Construction Academy recently received the National Career Academy Coalition’s Best New Academy Award. In January, Hamilton County received the Coalition’s Champion Award for outstanding development of career academies, a recognition of the system’s national prominence is high school reform. Literacy: Recognizing that literacy is the key to improved performance in all academic areas, each school has implemented a literacy program that addresses reading, writing and speaking. Literacy coaches work with teachers to identify at-risk students and then to design effective classroom strategies to improve the literacy of all students. Central’s plan begins in the ninth grade, during which each student works in a directed studies period on effective literacy strategies. Brainerd High’s model program has produced dramatic results in reading and writing scores.

Senior exit: Schools are hard at work developing plans to hold students accountable for what they know and can do after four years of high school through a senior exit process. As part of the single path diploma, students receive a credit for this process. At Central, seniors select one culminating task from a core course and one task from an academy elective to present and defend before a panel of teachers and community members. At Tyner High School, CSAS and 21st Century School, students present a senior exit project incorporating research, a product and a presentation. Senior exit programs allow students to reflect on what they have learned, apply knowledge to authentic world experiences, present to a select group and defend their knowledge. This form of accountability is exactly what the business community has requested.

College transition: The transition from high school to post-secondary study and/or the work force is a must for seniors. Central’s program serves as a system model. The 10-month Top Ten Program familiarizes students at every grade level with the 'Top Ten Things You Need to Know About Going to College.' As a result, our ACT scores showed the highest improvement in the system with a .2-point increase. Hamilton County ACT scores, and the number of students taking the ACT, have gone up three years in a row.

Intervention: A key question for any reform effort centers on what to do about students who fall through the cracks and just don’t improve. Our Carnegie/PEF initiative has helped us focus on intervention, thus enabling us to reach the goal of success for all students and to help us achieve good standing with the federal No Child Left Behind law. Central’s Pounder Challenge is a program designed to offer students assistance in course work they find challenging. As one example of this program’s success, every student placed in English 10 Intervention in 2004 passed the state-mandated end-of-year Gateway test.

Thanks to the leadership of Superintendent Jesse Register, the vision and financial backing of the Carnegie Corp. and the Public Education Foundation, the support of our central office and the work of dedicated principals, teachers and students, high schools are making great strides toward improved student achievement and making Hamilton County a national leader in high school reform.

Cathy Turner is change coach for the Carnegie reform initiative and academy facilitator at Central High School