ASCD 1 of 7 https www ascd org portal site ascd template MAXIMIZE menuitem 45 10 31 2008 7 59 AM ASCD 2 of 7 https www ascd org portal site ascd template MAXIMIZE menuitem 45 May 2008 Volume 65 Number 8 Reshaping High Schools Pages 8 13 High Schools at the Tipping Point Bob Wise The United States faces a choice Do nothing to fix a broken high school system and watch our competitiveness further decline or summon the political May 2008 will to demand change In today s knowledge based economy all students regardless of their home region background or college aspirations require a high quality secondary school education Unfortunately the education reforms of the past two decades in the United States have essentially ignored secondary schools focusing instead on the elementary grades Although building a strong foundation in the early grades is crucial to students long term educational success investing almost exclusively in pre K through 6th grade is not enough Every available indicator state national and international assessments of math and reading skills high school graduation rates college attendance and remediation rates and employer surveys tells the same story Too many high school students drop out and too many others graduate unprepared for college or employment To build on the improvements that committed educators have made in the early grades we must make an equal commitment to strengthen middle and high school students performance The Crisis That Demands a Response There is clearly a crisis in U S high schools Nationally barely 30 percent of rising freshmen can read at grade level Lee Grigg Donahue 2007 More than 1 2 million U S high school students drop out every year roughly 7 000 each school day Editorial Projects in Education 2007 Forty two percent of freshmen in community colleges and 20 percent of freshmen in public four year institutions require remedial courses in reading writing or math to handle college level work National Center for Education Statistics 2004 In survey after survey employers express disappointment in the skills of high school graduates For example in 2005 60 percent of U S manufacturing companies surveyed said that high school graduates were poorly prepared for entry level jobs National Association of Manufacturers 2005 On all counts students of color fare worse than their peers For too many poor and minority students rather than driving social equity our education system exacerbates a preexisting divide This is exemplified by the 2 000 U S high schools called dropout factories and serving mainly minority youth whose students stand only a 60 percent or less chance of graduating within four years Balfanz Legters 2004 The consequences of this crisis for dropouts and for society at large are severe A high school diploma is now a prerequisite for the majority of jobs In 2005 a high school dropout in the United States earned on average approximately 10 000 less annually than a high school graduate On average those with no high school diploma earn 260 000 less over the course of a lifetime than those who graduate from high school Rouse 2005 Moreover high school dropouts are far more likely to be tax consumers than taxpayers use welfare and public health services and commit crimes Researchers estimate that each high school dropout costs society at large about 209 000 over the course of his or her lifetime Levin Belfield Muennig Rouse 2007 10 31 2008 7 59 AM ASCD 3 of 7 https www ascd org portal site ascd template MAXIMIZE menuitem 45 Designed for a Different Era Why are U S high schools failing us Partly because they were never designed to meet today s moral and economic imperative of graduating all students When the modern high school system was established in the early 20th century only 10 percent of 14 to 17 year olds attended high school National Center for Education Statistics 2006 It wasn t until 1918 that all states required children to attend elementary school in that era a high school education was a luxury afforded only to upper income families Getting a well paying job without a high school diploma was not simply possible it was the norm Public Education 2007 Fast forward to 2008 when 90 percent of well paying jobs require post secondary education or training U S Department of Labor 2006 A constantly changing labor market has created new challenges students must acquire adaptable transferable skills as well as specific content knowledge to be adequate employees And as many markets go global the skills of U S workers and the standards of education must meet new international benchmarks Clearly the education goals of the United States have changed profoundly from those of a century ago Yet the typical U S high school education has remained virtually unchanged Classroom teachers are still often trained to be isolated content lecturers who engage in little collaboration with local communities colleges or businesses And high school students are still pushed into outdated one size fits all courses rather than given the personal attention and flexibility they need to stay on the path to graduation These antiquated practices show that the education system has not fully responded to changing demands and continues to be misaligned with the modern workforce This is not an indictment of professionals working in schools The fact that educators today graduate 70 percent of the nation s teenagers within a system that originally graduated 10 percent is phenomenal But even qualified and well supported educators struggle to meet continually growing demands because they work in a broken system There are exceptions in many high schools innovative educators are successfully preparing even the most challenged students for today s world However national efforts have for the most part simply propped up an antiquated system instead of rethinking and repairing it As one educator complained to me Every era of reform simply results in adding something onto the existing system instead of systematically redesigning it Three Approaches for Reform The old adage If you keep doing what you ve been doing you ll keep getting what you ve been getting is nowhere more true than in U S high schools But many high schools across the country even in some of the most challenging educational environments are not doing what they ve always been doing Such schools have altered how they do business so that all students graduate prepared for life Three key overall approaches have emerged