Is Senior Year of High School a Waste of Time?

May 2, 2012 | 4:57 PM

By Ida Lieszkovszky

Paul Robinson / Flickr

The Ohio Board of Regents and the Ohio Department of Education have teamed up to wipe out senioritis.

Graduation season is upon us, but many high school seniors have been coasting for months.

Ohio education officials hope to change that by revamping the senior year of high school and having students take college classes, do apprenticeships or get technical training.

“We have to find a way to maximize the12th- grade year,” said Ohio Board of Regents Chancellor Jim Petro on WCPN 90.3’s The Sound of Ideas this morning.

“We know that that can be very valuable. We know that very often kids have kind of completed their mandated courses, they’ve got their heavy lifting finished, and they kind of coast through senior year.”

By the time the second half of senior year rolls around, many students have completed their course requirements for graduation and may have even figured out where they will be going to college next fall. But Petro said the problem extends beyond students who have it all figured out and are chilling for the final months of their senior year.

Petro said, “Time is of the essence, and when we think about a failure to complete a degree – which is from my perspective a crisis in Ohio – we have too many kids who start college and college level work and don’t complete a degree.”

Petro said less than half of students who start college actually get a degree “because they take too much time in the process.”

In fact, 41 percent of Ohio students have to take at least one remedial course in college, and studies show students who need remedial education are less likely to finish their degrees.

The idea behind the overhaul is that by engaging students in post-secondary classes, internships or vocational programs, they won’t have that lag time to fall behind. If they aren’t ready for college academically, senior year is the time to catch up, and maybe even get a bit of a boost.

But students aren’t just getting to college academically unprepared. Rosemary Sutton, vice provost and education professor at Cleveland State University, said students often are not ready for the “freedom of college.”

“In high school, the teachers track the kids down, they know where they are, the parents are involved,” Sutton said. “By the time you go to college, there’s less of that, you go to class more often, you have to manage yourself better…and some of our students struggle with that enormously. “

Sutton said not only do programs like postsecondary classes help students’ progress academically, they also help prepare them emotionally for the college lifestyle.

You can listen to the entire Sound of Ideas here.

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Comments

Josh

There are some important voices missing from this story, and from other recent articles about this issue that have been published in the Plain Dealer as well. Where are the perspectives of students and teachers? They are missing. As a college prep senior English teacher in a suburban high school, I can tell you that my students work very hard until they begin their senior projects in May. They read challenging literature, write a research paper, and the majority of them stay engaged until the last minute. I invite the reporter to talk to talk to my students–and look at the work they have done–and see if she walks away with the same impression.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=185500167 Becka Leka-Hi

I think this is a great idea! I took advantage of Ohio’s Post-Secondary Enrollment Option my senior year of high school. I spent my entire senior year at a local private college, got a jump on my course work and it was entirely free. I would recommend this to many high school students but it can be difficult for some students to adjust to the flexibility of college life.
Susan

I agree with Josh^^. I don’t know any seniors who aren’t still in the thick of it working very hard to finish their courses. I am concerned that this is just another way to divert funding to the schools.
Susan

Correction: To divert money AWAY FROM the schools.
http://www.facebook.com/stephers1023 Stephanie Sipe

Once my daughter recognized the advantages (jump start on degree requirements-for free, experiencing ‘college life’, being solely responsible for her decisions…) of participating in the Post-Secondary program at Kent State she buckled down and improved her GPA. Mind you, she wasn’t there for remedial classes, and quite frankly the kids who are accepted into post-secondary must have a 3.5 GPA.

Something is amiss when students are granted admission to our state colleges, but then required to take “remedial” courses, which of course, cost the same as degree required courses. As to the readiness (read maturity) of 17 and 18 year old’s–how about we, teachers and parents, quite hovering over them?

Laurief

I agree completely with that last sentence. As a teacher of senior students, I am frustrated the second half of the year because so many of them have checked out mentally (and sometimes physically). My philosophy is not to call home for every single grade slip or infraction – these are soon-to-be or already are legal adults who need to learn responsibility for their own actions and their own education. I don’t have a conclusive answer, but parents and teachers need to be on the same page.

http://www.facebook.com/stephers1023 Stephanie Sipe

Where do you teach? Are your “college prep senior English” students seniors? I know it’s been awhile, but I and most of my classmates took “college prep Senior English” during our junior year.

Josh

As you suggest by your question, the issue of where I teach is very important. Strong school districts are preparing their students well. Poor school districts struggle to meet minimal standards. The issue that needs to be addressed is inequity.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1420241364 Amanda Iden Howell

Great idea!
I am a teacher but I agree with the idea of the end years of high school being wasted in this country. I realize many students are involved in rigorous studies their junior and senior years but it does not move them forward the way it should at that time in their lives.
I took post secondary classes in my senior year back in the ’90s. I completed a full year of college. It was a great experience which pushed me forward. I got many required classes done and was ready to pursue my major when I arrived at college the next Fall.
High school students could be preparing for careers through internships, vocational and trade training, college classes, etc. rather than advanced high school classes or coasting through their senior years. The advanced senior year classes may be good but they don’t move the students forward.
This is the direction we will have to move toward, people need to be better prepared upon graduating high school.
Europe and other countries recognized this and have been doing it for years. It’s been a long time coming here in the U.S.
Jbooth

I am a recent college graduate working in a inner city high school in Cincinnati. In college, I thought my suburban high school did a poor job of preparing me for college, even though I was a straight A student, but I got through after a 2 year adjustment period. Then once I got to the other end, in a lower performing high school, there is a major lack. They have Senior Projects and papers and presentations and whatever else, but the mindset is so relaxed that I seriously doubt the success of a lot of these students. There is a major disparity between what is needed and what is being done, and you wouldn’t know it unless you worked in a school like mine. It’s quite startling.

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