WEBVTT

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>> Ricci Hall: My
name is Ricci Hall.

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I am the principal at
University Park Campus School,

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in Worcester, Massachusetts.

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What we determined from
talking to our alums

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and surveying our alums and
getting this data back was

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that students struggled
with a number

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of important things relative
to their college success.

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They struggled with
mostly academic behaviors,

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the ability to participate
in study-skills kinds

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of activities, the ability
to attend to lectures,

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the ability to understand the
contextual knowledge of college.

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They had a hard time
making office hours

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with their professors, had
a hard time with the volume

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of reading, had a
difficult time managing tests

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and assessments at
the college level.

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>> Hall, to students: One of
the things that I have noticed

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about reading the anatomy book
is you can get really bogged

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down in the details, to
the point where you end

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up losing sight of the forest
to the trees kind of thing.

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So that instead of just opening
up the textbook and reading it

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to try to understand and letting
the stuff kind of just go,

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you are focused heavily on
every detail, and that just ends

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up obstructing your
ability to actually learn.

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>> Hall: We found that our
students were successful

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at the thinking that they
needed to do in college.

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They were good analyzers, good
evaluators, good interpreters,

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but they struggled with
some of the behaviors

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that were necessary to
be successful there.

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When you fall down, what
do you do to get support?

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How do you go find
your professor

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for extra assistance
and extra help?

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How do you get the
writing center's assistance

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for a particular assignment?

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Those were the areas
we felt most

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of our students really
struggled with, and we found

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that those were skills we
could explicitly teach.

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>> Hall, to students: One of
the things I want you to think

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about is how many times in your
middle and high school career

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at this school you have been
exposed to essay questions

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and how many times in your
middle and high school career

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at this school you
have been exposed

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to multiple-choice questions.

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And I wonder if your inability
to do, or your struggle with one

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versus the other may be just
also a matter of exposure,

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how many times you had it,

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which may be also something
we could think about.

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Like, is there a way
for me to go back

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and tell the seventh-grade math
teachers and science teachers

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to include some more
multiple choice?

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>> Hall: We began by redesigning
the way our senior year was

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experienced by our students.

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So we began first by having
students take semester-long

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courses rather than
full-year courses.

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We began by readjusting our
schedule for senior year

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by having to meet every other
day or three times a week,

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with a lab or with
a discussion group.

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We have our senior
teachers use syllabi

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and follow those
syllabi very carefully,

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in which the syllabus
becomes kind

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of the driving course
behind the entire class.

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We encourage teachers in the
senior year to have midterms

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and final assessments, smaller
number and larger assessments.

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So the kids can understand the
importance of not missing one

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of those assessments
or what to do

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when you are challenged with it.

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So those are the main
senior year redesign aspects

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that have really helped us
kind of make that transition

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between senior year/grade 12
and freshman year in college.

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>> Hall, to students: I
actually make my class

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in many ways very different
than the textbook reading.

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Because I have had a
number of science teachers,

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especially in college but
also other types of teachers

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in college, where you listen
to a lecture and you listen

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to their class and they spend
95 percent of their time talking

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about something and then you
go to their test or you go

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to their exam and none
of that's on there.

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It's all from the reading, it's
all from discussion lab maybe

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or something else, and so
you need to be able to figure

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out which scenario is the
case for you and which one is,

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you know, which one
you are actually in.

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>> Hall: So we really
changed, in fact,

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a lot of the instructional
modalities

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of our senior year classes to
really help students along with:

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How do you pay attention to
a lecture when it's going

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on for an hour, an hour
and half, about a topic.

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How do you take notes
in that lecture class?

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How do you plug into
that material in a way

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that makes it important
and salient to you?

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What are the steps you need

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to take before going
to the lecture?

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What do you do after
the lecture?

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Those [are] important pieces
that we weren't teaching kids.

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And since our kids are
first-generation college-goers,

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they just didn't have
those requisite skills

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and no one was really
teaching it to them.

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This redesign comes
as a shock to kids.

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They have spent here grade
7 through grade 11 working

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in a very nurturing
student-centered kind

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of environment, and the shock of
the senior year really is meant

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to kind of get them awake to a
new way of thinking about school

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and a new way to be
independent in that process.

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>> Hall, to students:
Well I hope, you know,

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especially as we continue

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to work towards getting kids
prepared for sciences in college

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and that's been a-as you know,

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and we have had frank
conversations

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about this-as you know it's
been one of our challenges

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to help make sure that
all kids are ready to,

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if they are interested in
studying a science in college,

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that they are prepared to do so.

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I am hoping that a lot of this
work now with you will help you

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as you take Bio 101,
Chemistry 101.

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You are going to have
this experience already

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under your belt with
me, and that's going

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to hopefully help you with the
skills you are going to need

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to be successful there.

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>> Hall: Because of that,

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we have had to support
kids along the way

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when they have minor failures
or when they do fall off track.

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And in fact, we want that
to happen in many ways.

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I want them to have that moment
of failure when they are still

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with us rather than when they
are a freshman in college

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and that failure may
ultimately cost them money

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and ultimately make them off
track for college readiness.

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One good example is a student
who doesn't turn an assignment

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in on time without asking for
an extension ahead of time.

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This is something
that's usually taken

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in a high school class
[as a] regular occurrence

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where a teacher just goes
to that student and says,

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"I noticed you didn't
turn in your lab report"

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or "I noticed you didn't
turn in this paper."

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Well, in college our students
were waiting for the professors

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to do that for them, and it
just doesn't happen that way.

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Instead you need to you send an
e-mail to the professor or go

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to the professor's office hour,

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ask for an extension
on the assignment.

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And when students fall down like
that here, it's important for us

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to have them experience
that failure

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to experience what's
going to happen

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and actually experience some
consequence to that behavior,

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so that we can then
think about it,

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reflect on it, and
talk about it.

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And hopefully it sinks

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in so they don't do
it again next year.

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The restructuring has
changed things, I think,

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significantly and
for the better.

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What I am hearing now from
kids who are coming back,

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and our alumni survey
really supports this,

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is that kids feel
much more prepared

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for the academic
behaviors that are going

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to be necessary for
their success.

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We have higher percentages
of persistence rates

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in those classes who have
experienced the senior year

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redesign than those that hadn't.