Lawmaker wants pilot program on college, career readiness

With BC-CNS-Readiness Program-Box

File Photo Available (thumbnails, captions below)

By JAMES KING
Cronkite News Service

PHOENIX (Monday, March 23) _ A Democratic lawmaker wants to establish a pilot program to allow high schools to develop their own profiles of whether students are ready for college or careers.

Rep. David Lujan, D-Phoenix, who also serves on the Phoenix Union High School District’s governing board, said current assessments don’t give a complete picture of whether students are ready for the next step.

“AIMS is great but provides poor data in terms of how ready a student is for college or a job, things we should be asking our students to strive for,” he said.

Lujan, the House minority leader, authored HB 2456, which would have a public high school district and several charter schools develop alternative school achievement profiles to gauge students’ readiness. The bill has passed two committees and is headed to the House floor.

The bill is a response to a study by David Garcia, an Arizona State University assistant professor of education leadership and policy studies. His research found that nearly 50 percent of graduates from Arizona high schools needed remedial math or English classes at a Maricopa County community college or one of the state’s public universities.

“The problem is that we’re not asking schools to get kids college ready,” said Garcia, who attended a news conference Monday with Lujan. “Just because you graduated from high school doesn’t mean they are ready for college or a career.”

Garcia said he’s found little correlation between AIMS scores and the percentage of students ready for college.

Tom Horne, Arizona’s superintendent of public instruction, noted that the state Department of Education already has a program, AZ LEARNS, offering success profiles for public high school districts and charter schools. However, he said he’s fine with Lujan’s bill as long as participating schools continue in AZ LEARNS.

“It’s not something I was originally behind it but it’s an experiment and if it works that’s great,” Horne said.

The Phoenix Union High School District is set to participate in the program should Lujan’s bill become law. Deborah Gonzalez, assistant superintendent for instruction and accountability, said the program is part of the district’s efforts to prepare students for college.

“AIMS is great for high school, but it doesn’t help us much beyond that,” Gonzalez said.

^___=

PHOTOS: Click thumbnails to see full-resolution images and download; caption information is in the file under File>File Info.

CAPTION FOR BC-CNS-READINESS PROGRAM: Rep. David Lujan, D-Phoenix, the House minority leader, is sponsoring a bill that would create a pilot program looking at whether alternatives to the AIMS test can better measure the readiness of high school students for college or a career. (Cronkite News Service Photo/Alyson Zepeda)