According to the Nebraska Department of Education (2009) the definition for College and Career Readiness is as follows: “A career ready person capitalizes on personal strengths, talents, education, and experiences to bring value to the workplace and the community through his/her performance, skill, diligence, ethics and responsible behavior… When students are career ready, they are prepared for the next step in their lives—whether that means getting their first job or beginning their college ‘career’ (which eventually leads to the workplace as well)! Being career ready also means being ready for life”
For some time now, Village School has been using Achieve 3000 as a tool to improve students’ reading skills and to help them achieve their learning goals when it comes to getting students prepared for the university. Research shows that the materials students will first encounter in college and careers are around 1300 L (Stenner, Sanford, and Williamson, 2012). Hence, it becomes imperative for us to prepare students with all the tools that they need for their university studies. But how are students doing this school year?
Comparative results show that at the end of August, ninth grade students were performing at 1036 L whereas two months after they were performing at 1092 L. That shows an increase of 56 L in two months. Tenth graders were performing at 1241 L in August and by the end of October they were performing at 1273 L. This shows an increase of 32 L in two months. Eleventh graders were performing at 1379 L in August and by the end of October there was an increase of 35 L showing an average result of 1414. It is pertinent to mention that these results show that the class of 2023 has already acquired the necessary College and Career Readiness Reading Skills in English.
Let’s look at their results in their mother tongue.
Results show that ninth grade by the end of August had an average Lexile of 1124. By the end of October showed an increase of 119L. Tenth grade had an average Lexile of 1107 and increased to 1392. This means an increase of 285 L. Eleventh grade showed an increase from 1356 to 1401 from August to October. This means and increase of 75 L. It is important to mention that in Spanish, students show that they have already acquired the College and Career Readiness Reading skills.
But what about Math?
The NWEA Generic Linking Study from the Fall MAP Results shows an increasing trend for the students in Math. As students advance from ninth grade to eleventh grade, a greater percent of students become part of the Advanced group and the total percent of student increases. This means that their Math Skills develop more year by year. Even if only 61% of the students comply with the College and Career Readiness standards, the trend shows that by the time they are in eleventh grade the percent increases and by the time they graduate, the vast majority have already acquired the necessary skills according to the College and Career Readiness Standards.
Before students take MAP each window, they work on their goals with their teachers. This process is very important because, it allows students to become aware of their results, and analyze if they have reached their goals or not in each window.
We invite our students to think about where they want to go and to read more about the College and Career Readiness Standards and to bear them in mind when they set their goals again in January.
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