By Del Stover
12/16/03 -- Confronted with growing numbers of overage middle school students, a number of school systems have opened alternative schools specifically targeting these students' needs.
In Cleveland, where as many as 14 percent of the city's 17,000 middle school students are at least two years older than their classmates, the Option School Complex at Margaret Ireland enrolls 400 students who are least two years older than their peers.
The school features a 15-1 student-teacher ratio, a full range of counseling and social services, and more individualized instruction than traditional schools.
"We are removing them from an environment where they haven't been successful," says G. Wayne Carter, who supervises Cleveland's alternative education programs. "In large schools, these kind of kids get lost. They tend to cut school or not attend school. So we are attempting to make schools attractive . . . and also provide some support and caring."
The need for such intervention is clear, educators say. The push for higher standards and an end to social promotion has fueled an increasing population of students who are one to three years older than their peers. These students are at high risk of dropping out.
It's a problem that "people are just waking up to," says Mary Reimer, spokesperson for the National Dropout Prevention Center. "What we're seeing now are students who aren't even making it to high school -- they're dropping out in middle school."
Although many schools provide what remedial help they can, some educators argue that a separate setting -- with smaller class sizes, better counseling services, and more individualized attention -- is the best strategy to pull these students up to grade level and get them back on track to high school.
In Cincinnati, the Lafayette Bloom Accelerated Middle School's "Back on Track" program accepts sixth and seventh graders and attempts to move them to an eighth-grade level as quickly as possible.
Advancing struggling students as much as two grade levels in a year is only possible because of the resources devoted to the students, says Principal Joseph Porter. The school day is an hour longer, and many students attend class throughout the summer. Tutoring services also are available.
A similar program is under way in Providence, R.I. The Urban Collaborative Accelerated Program (UCAP), a collaborative effort funded by three nearby school systems, is serving 134 students this year.
The academic program features an intensive focus on reading, along with project-oriented and hands-on learning. Tutoring is provided twice a week, and some students attend school on Saturday morning.
A fast-track approach to move students through the grades works because study is focused on mastering skills -- not on how many hours are spent sitting in a classroom, says UCAP Director Rob DeBlois.
"We give our kids an opportunity to break away from the Carnegie unit," he says. "It's a foolish idea that everybody learns at the same speed . . . that we can all start in the seventh grade and finish at the same time. We move you forward based on your ability to demonstrate what you understand."
Not everyone is convinced a separate educational facility is a better solution. Some worry that these schools will become a dumping ground where troublesome students are permanently warehoused. Concentrating these students together also raises concerns that academics and discipline will suffer.
"You have to worry about it," says James M. McPartland, director of the Center for the Social Organization of Schools. "It does label the kids. And you have to worry about it when you put a kid in a setting where all his peers have negative behaviors."
Such risks are more than offset by the benefits of a separate facility, says Christel O'Quin, principal of Mohican Education Center in Louisiana's East Baton Rouge Parish. She says it's important to remove students from a setting where they stand out for their size and age.
By placing them with students their own age -- and where all are attempting to catch up academically -- they begin to focus less on their failures and more on their successes, she says. Add more personal attention and instructional support to the mix, and these students begin to respond.
"It's an expensive operation," she says. At her 126-student school, "we have a top-heavy staff, with a dean, a teacher for instructional support, a counselor, and myself as principal. But we'll lose these kids if we don't do this for them."
For all their promise, however, these schools cannot guarantee that every student who completes the program will be ready for the transition to a traditional high school setting. Some are lost. And others are best served by switching to a GED program.
"All we can do is give students the chance to learn what they need to make choices to lead to a full, productive life," O'Quin says.
With that in mind, some of these schools choose not to accept students unconditionally. Instead, officials select incoming students based on the likelihood that they will respond successfully to the schools' accelerated programs.
At UCAP, "we try to weigh two things: the kids' ability to succeed here, and the need of the kids for the school," Porter says. "We try to balance the spectrum. One thing we're proud of is serving the kids who really need us."
In fact, many of the students who attend these schools are eager for a second chance, Carter says. "I don't want to give the impression we're successful with all of them. But most of them realize and are quite open about why they're in the school. They understand that this is their last chance."
Principals at these schools point to the importance of assigning good leaders, a committed staff, and adequate resources to the program.
If that's done, Porter predicts these schools will make a difference in the lives of overage students. In the three years he's worked at Lafayette Bloom, Porter says every student who has completed the program is still enrolled in high school.
"What we're trying to do [is] take these kids and say, 'We are here to give you a second chance. This is the way you can make it.'"