In my experience as an Academic Resource teacher at Springfield High School (SHS), I work with students whose academic challenges all too often coincide with struggles for basic needs – housing, food, and health care. Both from my experience and from my initial and brief research into SHS student demographics and drop-out rates, correlations can be made between economic disadvantage and disengagement from school. As I have watched a number of students disengage from school I have asked myself, what might have kept them in school? How can we provide a space for these students that utilize their interests and needs to reengage them in learning?
Springfield High School’s continuous improvement plan is to ‘increase student engagement and belonging at school,’ which aligns with the development of a new alternative program at SHS for at-risk students that might reengage them in learning through a process of creating their own pathway to proficiency or graduation. They will engage in leadership curriculum, learning both about themselves as participants in society and applying that knowledge to their daily activities in school and the wider community. I hope to use my time as a fellow to research and design this program, while engaging the student body, faculty/staff, and the Springfield community in that process. I am so excited about this opportunity for students and hope to keep their needs and learning as my focus throughout my time as a Rowland fellow.
