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Wednesday, March 8, 2006
The Detroit Public Schools system has teamed up with the Wayne County Community College District (WCCCD) to launch a revolutionary academic program that is certain to strengthen the city’s neighborhood high schools and provide students with a smooth transition into college.
Under this program, known as the DPS/WCCCD Virtual Early Middle College, students will be able to take three kinds of classes: college, high school and preparation examinations for the SAT and the ACT.
The classes will be taught by Wayne County Community College District instructors. The program will be piloted this summer at six high schools: Mumford, Pershing, Central, Western, Henry Ford and Redford, which already has a relationship with the college. Students from two middle schools will also take some high school credits online this summer. The program will be expanded to most of the city’s public high schools in the fall.
DPS is the first public school system in the Detroit metropolitan area to provide such an opportunity to its high school students.
“This collaboration with WCCCD is part of a master plan to engage students, improve our high schools and significantly reduce the dropout rate,” said William F. Coleman III, superintendent of the Detroit Public Schools. “More to the point, this program will provide our students with an opportunity to take high school classes that are not available in their buildings. It will also help them grow intellectually as they take college classes online at a premiere community college that is widely regarded as one of the best bargains in higher education. This is a wonderful avenue to expose our young people to the college and university environment. It will whet their appetites and steer them toward lofty goals.”
“We are very excited about the positive impact this pilot program partnership with DPS can have on high school students,” said Dr. Curtis Ivery, chancellor of the Wayne County Community College District. “By streamlining the ability to begin taking college courses while in high school, we make higher education a natural progression in the learning process.”
The college level classes will be open to 11th and 12th grade students. To be eligible, they must have a 3.0 grade average. In addition, they must have no serious disciplinary violations and fewer than 18 absences in a school year.
The Virtual Early Middle College is line with the state’s proposed graduation requirements that mandate having all high students take at least one class online.
The DPS / WCCCD Virtual Early Middle College will provide a wide range of services and programs to DPS high school students including:
• Coordination of efforts to provide assessment and technology preparation for high school students enrolling in online courses.
• Course preparation for the ACT/SAT as well as the Michigan Merit Examination.
• Online programs for academic credit such as mathematics, sociology, political science, civics and English.
• Access to some of the services of the college’s Foreign Language Institute. At this institute, students could study languages like Italian, Spanish and French online.
DPS will provide staff time to help with coordination. In addition to providing instructors and courses, WCCCD will provide instructors orientation sessions for parents and students.
“In today’s competitive market, a college education is a necessity for career success,” said Coleman. “And this initiative will ensure that Detroit high school students will get a jumpstart on their future careers and have direct access to the high quality educational services provided by WCCCD.”
