Taking charge of high school reform: the Breakthrough High Schools project studied 30 high schools that are raising achievement, increasing graduation rates and preparing students for college and work

Leadership, March-April, 2005 by Gerald N. Tirozzi

The high school reform "conversation" is occurring across the nation at events sponsored by the National Governors Association, the American Association of School Administrators, the Coalition for Community Schools, the Council of Great City Schools and numerous other national and local organizations. A major goal of NASSP is to serve as a voice for high school and middle school leaders.

By assuring that NASSP and its affiliates are represented every place that the conversation is being held, we work to make certain the practitioner's voice is consistently heard, and that school leaders continue to be a significant force in the struggle to take charge of school reform. Our organization and its members must raise awareness of high school reform issues nationwide by taking part in existing forums and by creating forums where voids exist.

Engaging business partners in contributing to the development of appropriate outcomes for graduates and supplementing scarce resources to implement improvements are areas where state affiliates should be particularly aggressive. Assuring that graduates leave high school with the high-level skills required by today's workplace necessitates a new look at curriculum and the "essential learnings" students must acquire for successful transition into postsecondary life.

Breaking Ranks II recommends that the content of the curriculum should, where practical, connect to real-life applications to help students link their education to the future. Business partners should be encouraged to participate in the identification of those skills and outcomes. Participation at that level can and should lead to helping local schools and districts provide resources in the form of internships, job shadowing opportunities, grants, etc. To facilitate this process, state affiliates and individual members should consider taking advantage of work being done by the NASSP Resident Practitioner for Business Partnerships.

The dialogue we engage in with elementary education and postsecondary partners will lead to the necessary seamless alignment in the education of our students. Where that alignment has been lacking, the instruction and skill gaps have resulted--one of the reasons for the often unprepared status of many graduates.

Principals and districts must collaborate with those who educate our students before and after high school to assure the elimination of those gaps and to make sure that levels of expectation are understood by all. The result will be that students arriving in 9th grade are prepared to do rigorous high school work, and are graduating prepared for the next level, whether that is in college, technical school or the workforce.

Clearly, NASSP and its affiliates are obligated to step forward and be a voice for the implementation of what we know to be best practice, research-based solutions to the problems existing in American high schools. We have, with the publication of Breaking Ranks II, provided a framework for the reform of our high schools that is not only based on known best practice, but also consistent with the recommendations of the Comprehensive School Reform model and other prominent reform blue prints.