Creating College Readiness: Profiles of 38 Schools That Know How

In June 2007, the Educational Policy Improvement Center (EPIC) was awarded a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to develop the College Ready School Diagnostic, a web-based diagnostic instrument. The purpose of this tool is to provide individual school profiles and customized recommendations, enabling each institution to make data-driven and systematic improvements to their programming, culture, and structure to improve college readiness for all students. The college readiness model is composed of four dimensions: (1) Key Cognitive Strategies; (2) Key Content Knowledge; (3) Academic Behaviors; and (4) Contextual Skills and Awareness. Studying the programs and practices of actual high schools that have demonstrated success in preparing underrepresented students in higher education was critical to the process of examining this comprehensive model of college readiness. To better understand the specific ways in which schools create college readiness, EPIC selected and visited 38 high schools from throughout the United States that had consistently graduated college-ready students from underrepresented groups. The schools selected for site visits represented a diverse cross-section of schools to ensure the validity of the College Ready School Diagnostic across a wide range of high school types. This report provides a profile of each of the 38 site-visit schools. The profiles detail how schools have implemented strategies to promote and advance college readiness. The report is organized into six sections: 1) alternative schools, 2) charter schools, 3) comprehensive schools, 4) early college high schools, 5) magnet schools, and 6) private schools. It should be noted that these categories are not mutually exclusive; in several cases schools could have accurately been assigned to multiple sections. For the purposes of this report, each school was placed in the section that the school and EPIC researchers agreed was the best fit. Individual profiles contain notes. (Contains 3 figures.)[Contributing writers included: by Carla Bowers, Katie Cadigan, Deanna Rivera, Teresa Gray, Marina Groenewald, Jody Kirtner, Kathryn Rooney, Mary Martinez, and Adrienne van der Valk.]