GEAR UP: A Capstone for Reform

by Steve Silver, Education Program Specialist

GEAR UP Program, U.S. Department of Education

http://www.ed.gov/gearup

 

 

Low-income high school graduates are less likely to go to a postsecondary institution than their middle and upper-income peers. Nearly all eighth graders say they want to go to college. While almost all high-income students meet their expectations, only two-thirds of low-income students see their expectations come to fruition (U.S. Department of Education, 1997). A significant percentage of those who do enter a four-year institution do not have the academic preparation that is necessary to succeed and obtain a terminal degree (USDOED, 2000). The achievement gap between low-income and high-income students and between minority and white students is significant:

 

However, it doesn't have to be this way. If low-income students are college-qualified[1] and take steps toward admission[2], low-income students attend a postsecondary institution at the same rates as middle and high-income students, with 96% of low-income students enrolling in postsecondary education, and 83% attending a four-year college or university (USDOED, 2000). Moreover, students from the lowest two socioeconomic status (SES) quintiles who are also in the highest Academic Resources[3] quintile earn bachelor's degrees at a higher rate than a majority of students from the top SES quintile.

 

Despite these figures, only 53% of 1992 high school graduates whose family income was below $25,000 were at least minimally qualified for admission at a 4-year institution compared with 68% and 86% of students with family incomes of $25,000 - $74,999 and over $75,000, respectively (USDOED, 2000). The mission of GEAR UP is to significantly increase the number of low-income students who are prepared to enter and succeed in postsecondary education. This cannot be done without providing a rigorous academic curriculum to all students. In addition, well-qualified, knowledgeable teachers to teach this rigorous curriculum must be the norm, not the exception, in low-income schools. Furthermore, all students must receive information and knowledge about postsecondary options and financial aid, and must receive assistance in taking steps towards admission.

 

GEAR UP is a vehicle for implementing these changes. The GEAR UP program is unique among federal early intervention programs in that its Partnership grants focus on cohorts of low-income students, rather than on distinct individual students, and the cohorts begin no later than the seventh grade. It requires partnerships among colleges and universities, schools, and outside organizations, and requires a dollar-for-dollar match to ensure commitment and build capacity. All of these unique requirements of the GEAR UP program compel school systems and postsecondary institutions to focus on systemic change; it ensures that all students are held to high standards and receive the necessary academic core curriculum that is needed to go to postsecondary education and succeed.

 

The children are not failing; the system is failing our children. GEAR UP is not an additional project in the array of existing programs that focus on reforming the child; it is a capstone for existing school reform efforts and a vehicle for fixing the system.

 

Why do these gaps exist?

 

Many teachers, administrators, and policy makers have come to the conclusion that socio-economic factors are an overpowering and interminable factor on student academic achievement. However, while SES factors are an influence in a student's life and education, they are not nearly as powerful as academic variables such a rigorous curriculums  curricular rigor and teaching quality (Alexander et. al., 1982; Education Trust, 1998). The level of academic resources (defined as the composite of high school curriculum, test scores, and class rank) produces a much steeper curve toward bachelor's degree completion than does socioeconomic status (Adelman, 1999). However, the level of academic resources and the impact of SES factors often covary and interact in determining student success.  For example, low-SESLow-income students are often assigned the least qualified teachers, especially in critical subjects such as mathematics and science. In addition, low-income SES students often lack the rigorous courses needed to enter college and successfully complete their degree. The problem then becomes self-perpetuating --– low standards are often set for these children, thereby reinforcing the pervasive belief in many of our nation's schools that low-income children cannot learn. Historically, federal and state programs have traditionally focused on the student and not the educational system—the environment in which learning occurs. Yet data on academic achievement are clear—it is the system that is failing many of our students, especially those of low SES status. Inequitable access to academic resources produces inequities in academic performance.  Students, especially low-income students, are being taught different curriculum, at different levels of rigor, and by a varying level of teacher quality. This gap in academic resources has occurred because the system has allowed such a gap to persist.

 Sschools functioning under these circumstances, despite admonitions against doing so, to track and sort out students based on a spuriously determined sense of “ability” and create a perpetual underclass of undereducated, unskilled adults in a society that is increasingly relying on a highly skilled and educated citizenry for its success. It is time—no, it is past time—that this cycle stop.

 

The evidence is clear: A student’s SES level has no deleterious impact on academic achievement when academic resources are high.Adelman (1999) showed that students from the lowest two SES quintiles who are also in the highest Academic Resources quintile earn bachelor's degrees at a higher rate than a majority of students from the top SES quintile.[RR1] Put as major statement at opening. 

 

The Problem

The assumption that if students are failing, then the students are the ones that need fixing is an incorrect assumption on its facenot the complete, let alone accurate picture, especilly if y9u are a low income student..  But historically federal and state programs have traditionally focused on the student and not the educational system—the environment in which learning occurs. But data on academic achievement are clear—it is the system that is failing the many of our students especially the low income students.students.  Inequitable access to academic resources produces inequities in academic performance. Students, especially low income students are being taught different thingsa different curriculum, at different levels of rigor, and by a varying level of teacher quality teachers; this gap in academic resources has occurred because the system has allowed such a gap to persist.  Explain this a little more or put this as the problem

 

The achievement gap between low-income and high-income students and between minority and white students is significant:

 

·By age 24, 48% of young people from high-income families graduate college, yet only 7% of young people from low-income families graduate by this age (Education Trust, 1998).

·The gap between white and minority 17-year-old students' scores on the NAEP reading exam has widened since 1990 (NCES, 1994).

·Only 2% of minority students can demonstrate learning from reading specialized materials, and only 1% have the math skills to do multi-step problem solving (NCES, 1994).

 

Low-income and minority high school graduates are less well prepared in general, and a significant percentage of those who do enter a four-year institution may not have the academic preparation that is necessary to succeed. Nearly all eighth graders say they assume they will go to college, but while almost all high-income students meet their expectations, only two-thirds of low-income students see their expectations come to fruition (U.S. Department of Education, 1997).  Put as your opening. Then say how GU through its mission is going to address this gap.

GU can be the capstone for all other program focused on particuolar programs.

 

 

Coursetaking Patterns. In the United States, 89% of the 8th-grade lessons were rated as having low-quality mathematical content, in comparison to 34% and 11% in Germany and Japan respectively (USDOE/NCES, 1999). Low-income students often take these low-level classes, and these:  course-taking patterns make it difficult for them to meet their expectations of going to college and succeeding. Tracking policies, low school resources, low teacher quality, and low standards all work in tandem to generate exacerbate the achievement gapthese inequalities. Over half of low-income high school graduates are considered qualified to go to college, in comparison with 86 percent of high-income students (NCES, 1992).

·Twenty-nine percent of African-American and 44 percent of Hispanic students were similarly qualified, compared with 61 percent of white students (NCES, 1992);.

·Almost twice the number of African-American students – -- 30 percent --–  were considered marginally or not qualified for college in comparison with the percentage of low-income students (NCES, 1992); and.

·Approximately 33% of urban students who are considering going to college do not exhibit the level of knowledge and academic proficiency that most colleges consider to be a qualification for placement in standard college-entry courses (ACT, 1999).

 

The effect of a high school curriculum of high academic concentration and quality on degree completion is far more positively marked for African-American and Latino students than any other pre-college gauge of academic resources (Adelman, 1999).

 

 However:

·African-American and Latino 10th graders are less likely to be enrolled in a college preparatory track (25% and 22% respectively) than white or Asian students (34% and 42% respectively) (NCES, 1995);.

What is needed is a clear commitment on the part of GEAR UP schools to eliminate academic tracking and to require that all students take a rigorous academic core curriculum.

 

Impact of Mathematics: . Of all pre-college curricula, bachelor's degree completion rates are the most strongly affected by the highest level of mathematics one studies in secondary school. :

 

·        (This bullet doesn’t follow the rationale stated above)Urban students who take Biology, Chemistry, and Physics courses score higher on the ACT Science Reasoning Test than students who do not take these courses (ACT, 1999).

·Urban students who take fewer than 3 years of science tend to score, on average, 3 points lower on the ACT Assessment Science Reasoning Test (on a 36-point scale) than students who take 3 or more years of science (ACT, 1999).

This bullet doesn’t fit either---if you want to add an additional “However” below this section and make a clear case for racism being at the heart of this, go ahead. However, these two don’t fit in here.

HoweverNevertheless, some some students also receive inadequate resources in their schools:

 

 

Poverty and Teacher Quality:. Students who receive three effective teachers in a row show gains in math and reading, and students who have three ineffective teachers in a row show losses (Boston Public Schools, 1998; Jordan et. al., 1997). However, those students who need qualified teachers the most tend to be the least likely to receive them. For schools who have under 20% of students on the free lunch program, 28%, 14%, and 19% of math, science, and English courses respectively are taught by teachers who do not have at least a minor in their respective content area. In districts with over 50% of students on the free lunch program, the percentages are 40%, 20%, and 31% respectively (National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, 1996).

·In schools with 90-100% of white students, 86% of math and science teachers are certified, and 69% have a BA/BS in science or math. However, in schools that have 90-100% of non-white students, the percentages drop to 54% and 42%, respectively (Oakes et al., 1990).

 

Poverty and Instructional Quality.: Standards and the quality of instruction also vary:

 

 

GEAR UP can help eradicate this problem. Providing an academically challenging and supportive experience is vital in making the 8th to 9th grade transition successful (Belcher & Hatley, 1994). If schools are going to mandate that all students will receive a rigorous academic curriculum, then schools must have the instructional capacity to teach these courses. GEAR UP provides funds for intensive and continuous staff development to increase and deepen the content knowledge of teachers, especially in math and science, where the need for qualified teachers is greatest. GEAR UP can leverage with current local and federal teacher quality enhancement efforts (see the Department's "Promoting Rigorous Standards for Teachers at http://www.ed.gov/inits/teachers/promote.html). Postsecondary partners can use GEAR UP funds or provide an in-kind match in providing free graduate-level courses for teachers at the building sites. This provides an incentive for teachers to deepen their content knowledge of their subject area. Teacher coaches are also important as part of the continuous learning and staff development process. Department heads and team leaders can function as instructional leaders and master teachers, providing peer mentoring to both beginning teachers and experience teachers. Most importantly, staff development must be tied with student achievement data, both as a means of needs assessment and of measuring the effectiveness of staff development programs (see the National Staff Development Council's web site at http://www.nsdc.org). Through the strength of the GEAR UP partnerships, which are critical to the success of GEAR UP, the schools and postsecondary institutions can leverage resources and increase the instructional capacity of the schools in response to the ramping-up of the academic curriculum.

 

Teacher and Student Expectations. Several characteristics of students' relationships with teachers may be predictors of motivation and adaptation in school. High motivation has been associated with having teachers who know, support, challenge, and encourage them to act independently (Wentzel, 1997). Similarly, research has found that students were more engaged academically to the degree that they perceived their teachers as holding high expectations for them (Murdock, 1999). Often, students who undergo difficulty with academic subjects are given fewer chances to choose topics or activities and do not feel in control over their own learning. In addition, if grouped with other students who have similar difficulties, at-risk students may be wary of peer-group collaborations (Hynd, Holschuh, & Nist, 2000). These findings may have important implications with regard to the effects of academic tracking on low-income students.

 

GEAR UP aims to break the self-fulfilling prophesy that is ingrained in so many of our nation's schools. Teachers must have high expectations for all students and must take responsibility for student learning. GEAR UP seeks to break the pattern of blame and denial and hold schools accountable for students meeting high standards. Principals of GEAR UP schools must adopt a "no excuses" attitude – they must demand that teachers and staff take responsibility for ensuring that all students achieve at high levels in a rigorous academic curriculum.

 

Effects of "tracking" on student achievement. The effects of academic tracking can be advantageous for those taking a rigorous curriculum, but can be devastating for those students pigeonholed into a low-level academic track:

·        Low-income students are less likely to be enrolled in a college-preparatory track (28%, as opposed to 65% of high-income students) and more likely to be enrolled in a vocational track (22%, as opposed to 3% of high-income students) (USDOED/NCES, 1995);

·        Students who reported being in the academic or the general curriculum program showed greater than average gains than their counterparts in the vocational curriculum program, thereby widening the gap of more than a standard deviation between the vocational and academic groups (USDOED/NCES, 1995);

·        With regard to reading skills, students in the vocational curriculum show significantly less gain than their counterparts in the academic group, widening a gap that already exceeded one standard deviation in eighth-grade (USDOED/NCES, 1995);

·        By the tenth grade, more than two-thirds of students in the academic curriculum were proficient in inferential reading, compared to just over a quarter of vocational students (USDOED/NCES, 1995);

·        Students who took either no science courses or only a general science course not only started with lower average scores in eighth-grade, but also gained significantly less than those students who took a biology course or a biology course plus either chemistry or physics (USDOED/NCES, 1995); and

·        Those eighth-graders who were enrolled in a vocational curriculum at the time of the first follow-up had scored nearly a half a standard deviation lower in science by the tenth grade that those who were in a general curriculum, and nearly a whole standard deviation lower in science than those in the academic track. (USDOED/NCES, 1995).

 

GEAR UP seeks to eliminate all forms of academic tracking by ensuring that all students complete a rigorous core academic curriculum that is aligned with what postsecondary institutions expect of high school graduates. The academic interventions support students in achieving these standards, and a process of continuous analysis and improvement provides input as to the effectiveness of these interventions and to continually make progress.

 

Successes in Low-Income Schools

Low-income and minority students CAN can meet high standards and succeed when sufficient academic resources are present.  In Kentucky, seven out of the top 20 elementary schools in reading are high-poverty, eight of 20 in math, and 13 of 20 in writing. In 1992, El Paso had 15 low-performing schools and no exemplary schools. In 1997, they had no low-performing schools and 16 exemplary schools. In 1999, The Education Trust identified 366 elementary and secondary schools that had been identified by their states as top scoring and/or most improving schools with poverty levels above 50%. How did these schools do it?

 

The 366 schools surveyed in the Education Trust report (1999) revealed several trends of these high-poverty, high-performing schools:

 

·        80% of these schools used state standards extensively to design curriculum and instruction, student assessment, and teacher evaluation;

·        78% of these schools increased instructional time in reading and math to meet standards;

·        Many of the schools devoted a larger proportion of funds to support professional development that focused on changing instructional practice;

·        Four out of five of these schools had implemented comprehensive systems to monitor individual student progress and provide extra support to students when needed;

·        Most had Ffocused efforts in involving parents to help students meet high standards; and

·        Half had state/district accountability systems that have real consequences for principals in the schools.

 

GEAR UP seeks to replicate the successes of these schools. It requires the implementation of a K-16 curriculum alignment; a rigorous academic core curriculum for all students; a continuous staff development plan that ensures that quality teachers with a deep content knowledge of their subject area are in the classroom; accountability systems to make sure teachers and administrators take responsibility for student learning; interventions that focus on brining students up to these high standards, not lowering standards because of low student achievement; and a comprehensive plan for ensuring students have the information and knowledge about entering and succeeding in a postsecondary institution. In addition, it requires data collection and analysis focused on showing continuous improvement and keeping with what works. To do this, GEAR UP requires a change in school culture. It requires ruffling some feathers. However, schools must continue to stay on the path to reform and not revert back to the ways of old. If we continue to do business as usual, we will get business as usual -- and as the data tell us above, business as usual is not acceptable for our nation's low-income youth.Comprehensive systems must be in place to monitor individual student progress and provide extra support to students as soon as it is needed—not waiting until the student stands at the door of a college or university, only to be led through the door marked “rRemediation”. But Yet none of the systemic changes will take place without the firm commitment of all educators that all children will succeed, and that all educators are accountable for student learning.

 

 

Such is the vision of the cohort model inherent in GEAR UP Partnership grants --– the vision that all educators must be accountable for the student learning of all children. That is what makes GEAR UP different from other federal programs that have traditionally focused on low-performing students without looking at the reason as to why they are low-performing. The cohort model compels the school to reform its way of doing business and become a high-performing school. Changes cannot occur if school systemss continue to do business-as-usual and continuepersist to assume in the assumption that the child and not the system needs fixing, but the system can operate in its status quo. Ensuring that all low-income students have the academic resources they need to succeed in a postsecondary institution cannot be accomplished without the sustained commitment to improving of school administration.

 

The commitment of the school leadership alone, however, is not enough. The commitment must exist among the entire school – teachers, guidance counselors, and staff – to set high standards for all children and ensure that resources exist to ensure that children meet them. College and university partners must work with the schools in aligning a K-16 curriculum by stating what level of learning is required to pass the entrance exams and to state explicitly what high schools need to teach to get students ready to enter postsecondary education without the need for remedial classes. Postsecondary institutions must know what they expect students to know when they graduate with a terminal degree. High schools, for their part, need to ensure that their curriculum is aligned with those expectations and that all children will receive this curriculum. Likewise, the high school needs to communicate to the middle school what is expected of incoming freshman, and middle schools need to ensure that all 8th graders have the skills needs to succeed in making the high school transition. Middle schools and elementary schools need to align their curriculum to make certain that students arrive at middle school with the proficiencies that are required. This vertical team – a K-16 team – must effectively communicate to parents this curriculum and that all children will be expected to meet them.

 

Sustained commitment and leadership are part of the vision of GEAR UP that is so crucial to its success. State GEAR UP programs provide the support for stronger accountability systems, standards curriculum alignment in the direction of collegiate expectations, and improved teacher quality and policy change to support local reform. In both State grants and Partnerships, partners must implement effective interventions be leaders in planning and implementing the program, measuring its progress on a continuous basis, and sustaining the gains in academic resources. All must be committed to the vision that all students will raise their level of performance to succeed, and must be willing to take on the systemic issues that are causing children to fail. The partners cannot be mere signatories. State educational agencies, postsecondary institutions, schools, and outside organizations must work together, with its own strategies, to plan together and leverage resources to ensure that progress is made across the K-16 continuum and that low-income students achieve at high levels.

 

I would eliminate the above paragraph because it doesn’t fit in with your emotional appeal.

 

We do not have the luxury of time. Our Too many low-income students are already behind academically. Changes must be made with the education they are receiving in order to accelerate their achievement in the proper courses that will allow them to go to college and succeed. That is why we must accelerate their progress --– so that they are achieving high standards and taking the rigorous academic courses needed to go to high school, graduate, and succeed in postsecondary education without remediation. However, we can’t accelerate their progress without knowing where they are today.  We can’t make improvements in student achievement without a careful analysis of the students’ accessibility to academic resources. Effective monitoring systems must be in place to provide ongoing analysis of intervention data and its impact on students --– data that enables schools to provide immediate support interventions to struggling students and to move them on quickly once they demonstrate mastery.

 

Schools must stay on top of the development of each of their students in order to ensure, and to ensure that no student falls through the cracks.

 

For this fiscal year of 2000-2001, there were 73 new GEAR UP partnerships and 7 new state GEAR UP grants awarded. With a strong educational experience, students will have choices about entering postsecondary education and being successful. This will mean :

more low-income students will take the rigorous academic coursework needed to be prepared to enter and succeed in postsecondary education;  

more schools will work to eliminate low-level academic courses;

more low-income students will be held to the same higher levels of academic achievement expectations as their peers;

 more teachers will  have deep content knowledge of their academic subject area and will be able to impart this to their students using effective pedagogies;

more low-income families will be well-informed of postsecondary options and financial aid, and take the steps necessary for admission into an institute of higher education. Anddost importantly.

With GEAR UP, more low-income students will go to college and succeed.

 

One thing is for certain --– we cannot continue to maintain the status quodo the same things we have doing, or we will continue to fail our many of our children. GEAR UP provides a unique and historic opportunity for early intervention and systemic change that no federal program has done before. GEAR UP should function as a capstone for current federal and local programs at GEAR UP schools. Programs such as Title I, TRIO, TQE[5], PT3[6], and other math and reading programs should leverage their resources and support the GEAR UP effort to implement and sustain reform. Congress recognized this need when creating GEAR UP as part of the unanimously bipartisan Higher Education Act of 1998 – —they recognized that it takes more than thinking we should that the focus needed to move from fixing children in order to fixing the future of American Educationsystem that serves them.  Congress designed GEAR UP to be unlike any other program.  And it is our jobIt is our charge to ensure that GEAR UP is the successful catalyst for closing the achievement gap among our nation's youth and reforming the American education system.m.

 

References

 

ACT and The Council of the Great City Schools (1999). "Gateways to Success: A Report on Urban Student Achievement and Course-Taking." (http://www.act.org/news/releases/1999/08-02-99.html)

 

Adelman, C. 1998. " Answers in the Tool Box: Academic Intensity, Attendance Patterns, and Bachelor's degree Attainment." Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, Office of Education Research and Improvement. (http://www.ed.gov/pubs/Toolbox)

 

Alexander, K.L., Riordan, C., Fennessey, J., and Pallas, A.M. 1982. "Social Background, Academic Resources, and College Graduation: Recent Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey." American Journal of Education, vol 91, pp. 315-333.

 

Belcher, D.C., & Hatley, R.V. (1994). A dropout prediction model that highlights middle level variables. Research in Middle Level Education, 18(1), 67-78.

 

Boston Public Schools (1998). "High School Restructuring." Boston: Boston Public Schools.

 

Education Trust (1999). "Dispelling the Myth: High Poverty Schools Exceeding Expectations." (http://www.edtrust.org/dispell.pdf)

 

Education Week (1998). "Technology Counts 1998." Editorial Projects in Education. (http://www.edweek.org/sreports/tc98/)

 

Educational Testing Service (1998). "Teacher Questionnaire from the 1988 NAEP Reading Assessment, Grade 4."

 

Hynd, C.; Holschuh, J.; Nist, S. (2000). Learning complex scientific information: Motivation theory and its relation to student perceptions. Reading & Writing Quarterly, 16(1), 23-57.

 

Jordan, H.R., Mendro, R.L., & Weerasinghe, D. (1997). "Teacher effects on longitudinal student achievement." Dallas Public Schools

 

Mullis, Ina V.S. et al. (1991). "The State of Mathematics Achievement:  NAEP’s 1990 Assessment of the Nation and the Trial Assessment of the States." Educational                 Testing Service.

 

Murdock, T.B. (1999). The social context of risk: Social and motivations predictors of alienation in middle-school. Journal of Educational Psychology, 91, 1-14.

 

National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future (1996). "What Matters Most: Teaching for America’s Future". (http://www.tc.columbia.edu/~teachcomm/what.htm)

 

Oakes, J. et al. (1990). "Multiplying Inequalities: The Effects of Race, Social Class, and Tracking on Opportunities to Learn Mathematics and Science." RAND.

 

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (2000). "The Condition of Education 2000." (http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2000062)'

 

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (1999). "The TIMSS Videotape Classroom Study: Methods and Findings from an Exploratory Research Project on Eight-Grade Mathematics Instruction in Germany, Japan, and the United States." (http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=1999074)

 

U.S. Department of Education (1997). "Mathematics Equals Opportunity." A White Paper prepared for U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley. (http://www.ed.gov/pubs/math)

 

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (1997). "Access to Postsecondary Education for the 1992 High School Graduates." (http://nces.ed.gov/pubs98/access/index.html)

 

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. "NAEP 1996 Math Data Tables."

 

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (1995). "National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988: Second Follow-Up, 1992" in "A Profile of the American High School Senior in 1992." (http://nces.ed.gov/spider/webspider/95384.shtml)

 

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (1995). "Vocational Course-Taking and Achievement: An Analysis of High School Transcripts and 1990 NAEP Assessment Scores." (http://nces.ed.gov/pubs/naepvoc.html)

 

U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement (1994).  "What Do Student Grades Mean?  Differences Across Schools."  Educational Research Report. (http://www.ed.gov/pubs/OR/ResearchRpts/grades.html)

 

Wentzel, K. (1997). Student motivation in middle school: The role of perceived pedagogical caring. Journal of Educational Psychology, 89, 411-417.

 

 

 


[1] The 4-year college qualification index is based on high school GPA, curricular rigor, SAT or ACT scores, senior class rank, and the NELS 1992 aptitude test.

[2] Took a college admissions test (SAT or ACT) and applied for admission to a 4-year institution.

[3] A composite measure of the academic content and performance the student brings forward from secondary school into higher education. This measure is dominated by the intensity and quality of secondary school curriculum.

[4] Risk factors for not persisting in college included coming from a low-income family, having neither parent going beyond high school, or attending a high school in which 25% or more of the students were eligible for free or reduced-price lunch.

[5] Teacher Quality Enhancement (http://www.ed.gov/offices/OPE/heatqp/)

[6] Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers to Use Technology (http://www.ed.gov/offices/OPE/PPI/teachtech/teachtech.html)

 [RR1]. (State a clear point here in Engish