New Orleans, a city of neighborhoods, is a very territorial place, Linda Fortenberry told conference attendees. And some students, she said, "never come out of their territories." This is one reason why Fortenberry, an assistant superintendent for the New Orleans Public Schools, believes so strongly in the World of Work Academy, a three-week summer program that pairs middle school students with workplace mentors.
More than 700 management-level professionals welcome Academy students to their offices and boardrooms for three hours a day, three days a week. Through the job shadowing, the students, who are not paid, see how responsible adults make a living and contribute to the community. "Students need to see how success in the classroom can be related to success in the workplace," Fortenberry asserted.
Fortenberry pointed to improved test scores and better school attendance as indicators of the Academy's success. Ultimately, she thinks the program will result in more students graduating from high school. One New Orleans middle school teacher concurred. "The World of Work Academy has given students a new language, a new direction, and a new attitude," the teacher told conference attendees. "It's an experience that remains with them."
At the Howard High School of Technology, in Wilmington, Del., a similar program, called Quest for Quality, helps students make informed career choices by requiring them to create vision statements and then determine what skills they need to realize their visions.
The students enrolled in the vocational-technical program also learn about the personal, academic, and interpersonal skills they'll need to be successful in the workplace, said Dawn Gradzinski, who teaches in the Quest program. Additionally, students learn how the habits they form in high school can hurt them later in life. "We tell students that coming to school late, three times a week, is not good," Gradzinski said. Such Quest lessons are validated by workplace mentors when students begin job shadowing in the 10th grade.
Establishing a program like Quest for Quality requires schools to develop a school-community link. To make it easier for companies to mentor students, Gradzinski advised schools and districts to consider obtaining the necessary liability insurance for students and to provide transportation to the job sites.
The Quest for Quality program has been available to students since 1993, and has helped turn Howard High School around, said Gradzinski. The composite grade point average has increased by 75 percent, daily attendance is up by 4 percent, and there has been a 40 percent increase in students meeting or approaching state writing standards. As one student wrote in a brochure describing the program, "I am more serious about my studies now than I ever was before. I know what is expected of me, and even more important, I know why."