9-12

This report from the Coalition for Community Schools discusses the idea of the community school, its elements, and the role of the community in student success in public education. It also provides examples of programs and snapshot vignettes of successful schools.

This brief from The Education Trust explores the need for stronger federal policy that requires high schools to adopt graduation rates – in addition to achievement indicators – as a measure for student and school progress. By identifying varying state-based definitions of Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and successful state policies, it suggests ways in which No Child Left Behind (NCLB) can be altered when reauthorized to improve outcomes for all student subgroups across the country.

Based on data reported by state education agencies to the National Center for Education Statistics, this report presents on-time graduation rates for public school students in the school years 2002-2003 and 2003-2004. The U.S. Department of Education has identified this Averaged Freshman Graduation Rate (AFGR) as an important interim measure in response to a growing concern regarding the accuracy and compatibility of state-reported graduation data.

This report from the National Dropout Prevention Center/Network outlines strategies schools can implement for improving attendance and truancy, and subsequently dropout rates. Strategies are categorized into four general strands: school and community perspective, early interventions, basic core strategies, and making the most of instruction. Accompanying each strategy are recommended resources and model programs.

This report, produced by Civic Enterprises, surveys young dropouts aged 16-25 from around the country to better understand and contextualize the circumstances that led these young people to drop out of high school. Student perspectives are integrated with data synthesized from other studies and papers to meld individual student insight with macro-level research.

This report, prepared by Achieve, Inc., for the project Staying the Course: High Standards and Improved Graduation Rates, pushes for states and districts to build longitudinal data systems to track student progress and engagement in the hopes of identifying potential dropouts and at-risk students early enough for successful intervention.

This report from the National Partnership for Teaching in At-Risk Schools outlines reasons why there are relatively few effective or highly qualified teachers teaching in at-risk urban and rural high schools when compared to their suburban counterparts. It suggests research-based solutions on how to attract and retain these highly skilled teachers for at-risk high schools.

Authored by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, this report outlines a framework for redefining high schools in the 21st century by incorporating traditional high school core academic subjects with 21st century skills and content.

This meta-analysis of 31 studies examined whether reading interventions could assist elementary, middle, and high school students with reading difficulties and learning disabilities. Overall, results showed that students who received a reading intervention outperformed students in the control group. This positive effect was also found for students with disabilities across all measures. Further, with few exceptions, studies that examined reading comprehension found that reading interventions could have a positive effect on reading comprehension.

This Alliance for Excellent Education policy brief provides an overview of the data collected on student writing achievement, recommends more opportunities for students to practice writing in school, encourages schools to teach better writing instruction, and offers policymakers suggestions on how to support school improvement efforts in this area.