Anchorage’s Graduation Coaches Making a Difference (With Sniffle-inducing Video)
I remember the first time I heard about graduation coaches. It was back in February of this year, when Mayor Sullivan made clear he preferred political posturing over adequately funding our school district. By pitting these graduation coaches—who represent the last, best hope for many kids in our community—against other worthwhile imperatives like reducing class sizes, the mayor forced our school district into horrible choices. But hey, at least there’s always money for party planners, hinky life insurance payouts, and for a political crony like Dan Coffey to get his habitual cut.
Graduation coaches, summer school, school secretaries, and a host of others were on the chopping block. Fortunately, most of the budget was able to remain intact, including the graduation coaches. And that has turned out to be a very good thing, indeed.
Just five years ago, Anchorage’s high school graduation rate was staggeringly low. Superintendent of Schools, Carol Comeau noted “Now, more than ever, our young people are leaving school with a high school diploma. Our graduation rate is near 72 percent, up from 62 percent just five years ago. We still have a long way to go but our efforts are working, and this is good reason to celebrate.”
Part of this success is due to the fact that in 2008, the Anchorage School District hired Graduation Support Coordinators, or “graduation coaches”, to help increase graduations and reduce the dropout rate. Last year, the Anchorage Council of Education/AFT Local 4425 (ACE) received a prestigious American Federation of Teachers (AFT) Innovation Fund grant to partner with the Anchorage School District in supporting graduation coaches as essential support staff positions in high schools.
So, what exactly is a graduation coach? “Sounds like some namby-pamby librul made-up nonsense job,” you can almost hear the budget cutters say. “Back in my day, kids had boot straps they could pull themselves up by!” Well, here’s what they do, and why they are so important. Graduation coaches work with only the most at-risk students. They become part of a student’s life, and learn about what’s going on at home, creating strategies to help the student succeed. They work closely with students, school faculty and parents to achieve this goal. They care, they follow-up on a daily basis, and they let students know that they care about their success.
At the Anchorage School Board meeting last night, testimony was given in support of graduation coaches. 750 at-risk kids are supported by the program, and last year, 148 graduates were directly linked to the services provided by their graduation coaches. The number this year is anticipated to be much higher.
ACE showed the following video to board members and those in attendance. I’m warning you now – get a hanky. I’ve seen this video several times now, and it gets me every time. It tells the story beautifully, and I defy anyone who watches it to call the amazing people who do this work unnecessary.
The video received a lump-in-the-throat ovation from the audience and the school board. Board members seemed universally impressed, and Jeannie Mackey was the first to speak, “Thank you for bringing faces to this. That was amazing.”
Graduation coach Eric Spade, who is featured in the video, gave testimony last night. “Personally, I would like to see the program expanded, and I think all the other graduation coaches would agree with me. It’s always a funding issue, but everybody has consistently agreed that you need to start intervention early.”
~Board members and the audience watch the graduation coach video
Superintendent Comeau was moved. “You should be so proud of the work you are doing. The video is amazing. Thank you on behalf of the district. When people criticize us for adding extra positions because enrollment is flat, these folks are a good example of how that makes a difference. This video will be played more than a few times.”
Even if your heart is a giant lump of ice, and all you care about is the bottom line, remember that students who graduate are less likely to commit crime, more likely to go to college, and more likely to find a good job. They are more likely to become productive members of society who pay taxes, rather than being a societal burden. And their children are more likely to graduate too. Each year’s class of dropouts will cost the United States over $200 billion during their lifetimes in lost earnings and unrealized tax revenue.
Supporting kids and giving them their best shot at success is the true meaning of “No Child Left Behind.” So, the next time the budget cutters rear their red pens, remember the teachers, the support staff, and the graduation coaches who are out there every day working hard for our kids and growing the next crop of community leaders. They do make a difference – every day.
Anti-truancy, pro-graduation “union thugs” Corinne McVee & Stephen Brown of ACE
I have never heard of Graduation Coaches. What a moving story and video. Of course, they make a difference. This is an idea that should spread across the country. Thanks for posting.
Why does the cost of education keep going up? Because schools are expected to keep doing more and more. Graduation coaches are an additional service being provided to help more kids graduate. Ultimately, that benefits everyone because those kids can be more successful (and pay more taxes) if they graduate. What a great program. Now we just need to expand it to all grade levels. If they don’t learn good attendance practices in elementary school, they won’t be good at attending high school.
In years past, I was a busy, active volunteer in our public schools here in Texas. However, I do not recall hearing anything about a great program such as this before now. It makes all the sense in the world. I salute the Anchorage school district for taking the steps needed to advocate for, and help, kids survive their tough high school years and actually graduate.
Now, I’m interested to learn if we have anything similar to graduation coaches down here in my neck of the woods. Hmmmm…..
Excellent program. Congratulations to the graduates and their mentors!
Sounds like a wonderful program. Probably all urban areas need it. That practically guarantees that Republicans in power would want to ax it.
In California we have alternative high schools for those kids who have gotten behind and would otherwise drop out. I have taught at one of those for about ten years, and I can tell you that our graduation ceremonies are something to behold. Many of our grads give speeches during the ceremony, and there isn’t a dry eye in the house.
These are the invisible kids, the ones who cause a sigh of relief in rambunctious, over-crowded classes when they give up and quit. They are often the ADD/ADHD kids, the kids from broken, impoverished homes, and the kids who are abused and neglected with alcohol and drug-addicted parents. These are also kids who are so often bright and creative, yet they think they are stupid. These are the kids in whom nobody believes. However, our school has no graffitti, etched desks, or broken windows because our students take pride in their school and in themselves. We have students who have gone on to become college grads, MBAs, and even one with the highest security clearance the USA gives in the military for intelligence work.
Your at-risk students in Anchorage deserve everything you can give to help them graduate. They aren’t throw-away kids.
I’ve heard a similar description of graduation from our local alternative high school. The staff at the school seem to be truly remarkable people. So much can be done for the young people in this country; if only we all cared enough.
No kid is a throw away. Not one.
Thank you for being one of the people who makes a difference for kids some folks are too unimaginative to think of a way to help learn.
Every kid matters.
Working with these kids is so addicting! We get to see them make profound changes in their lives and go on to productive citizens. Pay now or pay later (welfare) to help them. Our kids keep coming back to visit. We can’t even go to the store without running into them and getting hugs. They make my life worth living, so really, I’m the one who is blessed. I know our whole staff feels the same way.
Paying now is a small price and it is our duty to those come after us to pay those before us who did it for us
You ever read Erik Erikson’s Identity and Uprootedness in Our Time?
“…there is a “natural” period of uprootedness in human life : adolescence. Like a trapeze artist , the young person in the middle of vigorous motion must let go of his safe hold on childhood and reach out for a firm grasp on adulthood, depending for a breathless interval on a relatedness between the past and future, and on the reliability of those he must let go of, and those who will “receive” him . ”
For young folks who may not have or perceive they do not have a safe hold anywhere in that trajectory which delivers them into an adult identity and place in the adult world that they understand, we must stand , communities, coaches, teachers, families, as spotters and helpers.
It is our duty.
I have never heard of it, so thank you for the recommendation. Many of us grew up with a safety net that remains in place well into adulthood. At-risk kids usually have no safety net. Many have already been in foster care and juvenile hall. Most of our kids already have probation officers when they come to our school.
Erickson was a clinical psychologist noted for establishing a “schedule of virtues” as a way to talk about the strength healthy human development confers on individuals and, by extension, society. One of his essays about that , Human Strength and the Cycle of Generations, is in a book, Insight and Responsibility, along with the other essay I noted.
When kids are let down by their families and/or neighborhoods, people like you , the ANC coaches et al , serve a vital function which benefits us all- the kids and society.
We don’t get to talk about purely human questions enough in this time of financializing too many of our activities. While it is possible and now the norm, to point to the lower costs to society of supporting at-risk youth as a foil to the chatter about boot-straps and all that crap which some use to explain their writing off kids at risk, poor people, etc. I would love to see us breathe life back into some of the best of old notions about the duty of communities to welcome and nurture their children , to re-establish the values of community which cannot fully be described in economic terms.
back in my studying days i was quite the fan of erikson.
i might have to revisit him.
I did support work and later volunteering with a school like this in the east, in some of the most densely population areas. What I got to observe, and sometime help just a tiny bit, was so special.
The teachers and staff are extra special, even those that sound the toughest and most hard hearted, in that they help these kids in so many ways we can’t measure.
For Anchorage to have this service for their kids is outstanding and something I would love to see more of in all areas it is needed, even given the cost.
Our kids are our future, even if they are not your actual children. We have to offer them the best we know how if we want our country and world to move forward.
I wonder why that is so hard for many to see?
Thanks for letting us know about these great people and the work they do!!
I think they can’t see because too many people are pre-occupied with marking their territory and grabbing all that they can. They don’t look outward and reach downward to give others a hand up. We are living in incredibly selfish times when people are busily stepping on each other in order to rise upward, but what about those who are being stepped upon? Don’t they also deserve a chance? In a country like ours, why can’t everyone have some measure of the American dream? Why does only 1% get the dream while much of the 99% are trampling each other?
Oh, geez. I am a mess. Bravo to the students, their coaches, and the school district for not shoving the children into a box where they can just quit. Bravo for those who care. Bravo for those who act.
yep, teary eyed here.
bravo to the graduation coaches. super heroes all.
These kids should be able to work. They should be the custodians cleaning bathrooms in their school. Yeah, right Mr. Gringh.
That man has no vision. I don’t want a guy with no vision.
I think any of these grad coaches or their students would make a better president. They’re people to be proud of.
No lump in my throat, no hanky needed, no tears here
A huge YEEHAW!
Congratulations and go get em, kids!
Go coaches!
Go ANC School District!
Pffffffftt on the mayor for even considering dropping such an effective program.
I have been very frustrated being unable to hear the video as my computer is without sound. Finally, I got on a non-mute machine and I am so glad I did.
This is quite wonderful. I know the almost magical effect of having someone wholly on your side, someone whose belief in you is unwavering and true. When you think about it, it’s so little in a way – belief — and yet it is big enough to be everything.
“Our graduation rate is near 72 percent, up from 62 percent just five years ago”
ANC School District should be proud , very proud.
Don’t relax, don’t get comfy.
We worked hard here to raise the graduation rate in Juneau. 2007 saw a 65.8 overall rate, which bumped way up for a couple years
but :
“The graduation rate for Juneau School District high school students dropped by 7 percent 2009-2010 from the previous year, according to a student achievement report presented Tuesday at the Juneau School District board meeting.
The report revealed that not only did the overall graduation rate drop from 76.7 percent to 69.7 percent, but the rate for Alaska Natives fell from 60.4 percent to 50 percent.”
http://juneauempire.com/stories/091710/loc_708915038.shtml
Every tiny bit of every % is a real live kid. We can’t relax, we can’t get comfy.
Anchorage is doing great with both the graduation rate and the drop out rate (they are not inverse of each other), but we saw a slight reversal last year. And the rates for AK Natives and some other ethnic groups and economic groups are still dismal.
I have heard good things about Juneau, and I am sure Juneau school district also has much to be proud of. It is a never ending battle to keep improving when there are so many other factors beyond the district’s control. As I read earlier somewhere, poverty is not an excuse, its a fact.
Thanks, AKM, for the hanky warning. I needed it. What a great group of people in the video! I hope the graduation coach concept catches on elsewhere (Brooklyn, Bronx, I’m thinking of you).
Yes, Carol Comeau should run for Mayor. What a great program. As for what to do next, ASD should track the college academic performance of a sample of its graduates. I suspect some strong themes about reading and mathematics would emerge.
I remember seeing the testimony last year regarding the coaches…I’m so glad there is a video now showing everyone why they are needed.