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The Secret to Preventing Community College Dropouts? Start With Middle School

Edsurge

We started back in 2008, and look where we are right now. Mary Jo Madda ( @MJMadda ) is Senior Editor at EdSurge, as well as a former STEM middle school teacher and administrator. Today, we had our 62nd district visit the VITAL program in 2 years to ask that very question. What we tell people is, you have to start slow.

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PROOF POINTS: Inside the perplexing study that’s inspired colleges to drop remedial math

The Hechinger Report

When Alexandra Logue served as the chief academic officer of the City University of New York (CUNY) from 2008 to 2014, she discovered that her 25-college system was spending over $20 million a year on remedial classes. The confusion stems from the study design.

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Kids are failing algebra. The solution? Slow down.

The Hechinger Report

A 2008 study in Los Angeles public schools found that those who didn’t pass algebra by ninth grade were half as likely to graduate as those who did. Math courses are “the most significant barrier to degree completion in both STEM and non-STEM fields,” the authors concluded. Algebra I is the air you breathe to be in STEM.”

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Colleges are using big data to track students in an effort to boost graduation rates, but it comes at a cost

The Hechinger Report

For an absurd example, if dropouts tended to take classes on Thursdays in their first semester at college, but students who completed their degrees didn’t, then you might worry about current students who are currently taking classes on Thursdays. The dropout problem got a lot worse in the 1990s when more people started attending college.

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For some kids, returning to school post-pandemic means a daunting wall of administrative obstacles 

The Hechinger Report

Related: When the punishment is the same as the crime: Suspended for missing class To many observers, Tameka’s troubles stem from Atlanta’s rapid gentrification. But she should act fast, the social worker urged, or the department might have to take action against her for “educational neglect.”

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How a Chinatown school is trying to bring more diversity to theater

The Hechinger Report

A study found an 18-percent difference between dropout rates for low-income students with high arts participation (4 percent drop out) and those with less arts involvement (22 percent). Yet, funding for the arts currently shows no sign of rebounding from cutbacks stemming from George W.

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Charter schools nearly destroyed this New Orleans school. Now it will become one.

The Hechinger Report

A student jumps off a bus to enter McDonogh #35 Senior High School before the start of the school day March 19, 2008 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Funding for McDonogh 35, New Orleans’ last noncharter school, fell from $15,594 per student in 2008-09 to $11,651 per student in 2016-17. Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images).

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