College Ready Education: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Fewer, Clearer, Higher:  Moving Forward with Consistent, Rigorous Standards for All Students

The new Common Core State Standards will bring consistency and clarity to American education. These college- and career-ready academic standards will provide a springboard for innovation in education. And, crucially, they will help educators improve student achievement levels, an outcome that will benefit students personally while also fueling our nation’s future economic success.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other philanthropies actively supported the Common Core State Standards Initiative, led by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association. But over the past several years, we’ve been thinking independently about the power of such standards, too.

We see these rigorous, clear standards as critical to better student results. But policymakers need to build on that foundation and ensure that teachers have what they need to do their jobs: things like rich assessment systems that yield useful, timely data; tools that help teachers translate such assessments into more-effective instruction; and evaluations and compensation systems that reward teachers for improved student results.

http://www.gatesfoundation.org/highschools/Documents/fewer-clearer-higher-standards.pdf

High School Readiness - career success starts now!

A recent survey of human resources managers for large companies found that 42.4 percent of them rate the overall preparation of high school graduates as deficient.[i] Some of these deficiencies then limit higher education attainment especially for critical disciplines such as the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics fields. The Council on Competitiveness reports that the United States ranks 17th among developed nations in the proportion of college students receiving degrees in science or engineering, a fall from third place three decades ago. We rank 26th in the proportion receiving undergraduate degrees in mathematics. Europe produces three times as many engineering graduates every year as the United States, while China produces five times as many. 

America’s schools and job training programs are not producing a sufficient number of people qualified to fill the jobs in highest demand now and in the years to come. Some experts predict that within a decade, 123 million high-skilled, high-paying jobs will exist, but just 50 million Americans will be qualified to take them. 

In order to stay competitive, American businesses will have to play a bigger role in our educational system to modernized teaching, development, and training for a 21^st century workforce environment. Depending on the nature of their industry, corporate leaders along with the human resources division will have to evaluate their human capital plan to include more robust talent development and acquisition objectives. Some of these objectives should include more strategic campus programs that include community and technical colleges. The plan should also include a more aggressive corporate leadership development programs that includes scholarships, internships, mentoring, and full-time placements to align with recruiting needs.

Ful article

http://ncf.uschamber.com/blog/2012/11/3600000-open-jobs-and-skills-gap-issue-american-businesses

College and Career Readiness

College and Career Readiness: A Quick Stats
Fact Sheet
By Makeda Amelga, National High School Center at the American Institutes for Research
The transition from high school into college or the workforce is a key turning
point in the lives of young people. Regardless of their chosen career or
academic path after high school, young people must have the capacity to
address complex problems in order to maximize their potential for
professional and personal success. Far too many students—especially at-risk,
special education, and minority students—are not receiving an education
that adequately prepares them for life following high school.
The attahced statistics highlight some of the challenges and opportunities
facing high school students after graduation

http://www.betterhighschools.org/pubs/documents/NHSC_CollegeCareerReadinessFactSheet_Oct12.pdf