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Highlands Today

Career Academies

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Shelly Davis Word

Published: October 13, 2008

Thank you to Marc Valero for his article on the Career Academy. I want to add a comment that should go hand in hand with the quote from Mr. Lemler, "The academy is trying to prepare students, who don't plan to attend a four-year college." The national trend in career academies is to be an alternative route to a four-year college. The students are able to see the relevance of their education through the practical classes in the academy. Their GPAs improve, their test scores improve and the graduation rate improves.

In many established career academies throughout the United States, administrators are finding that a large majority of the students are planning to pursue higher education after graduation. One of the benefits of going to the career academy is the ability to earn dual enrollment college credit while still in high school.

Regardless of college attendance, the facts show that students who graduate from career academies make significantly more than their counterparts in traditional high school eight years after graduation. For more on the changing role of career academies, see the "Reshaping High Schools" issue of Educational Leadership, May 2008.

Please, let's not stigmatize academy students that they are not college material. If the career academy carries through with their mission, they will be the best prepared for any route ahead of them, whether college or the working world.

Shelly Davis Word
Sebring

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