Students lend hand in local schools

Up a hill and down a winding road, tucked behind a neighborhood of houses mere miles from Pitt’s upper campus, 10th-grade students are handed copies of the PSAT at Pittsburgh University Preparatory School at Margaret Milliones. But there is just one problem — the test is foreign to them.

Pitt junior and UPrep Milliones tutor Cassie Chew recalled a time when she stood in shock as she found herself explaining the importance of the test to the students’ future admittance to college, only to be met with a bleak response, as a UPrep student looked at the test and ironically responded, “Let’s be real here, nobody here is going to college.”

The Pennsylvania System of School Assessment has released data showing performance in the Pittsburgh Public Schools sinking on yearly academic benchmarks. To combat this trend and strengthen academic help in the classroom, Pitt students, like Chew, are pairing with after-school and school-day programs to tutor children and improve academic performance.

“I think it’s really helpful to realize how lucky [Pitt students] are to have the opportunity to get a college education,” Chew said. “Everything we complain about, like tests, is so irrelevant when you think about all of these people who have lost hope for the same opportunity. It makes you realize how inappropriate our attitudes are.”

State-wide test scores determining schools’ adequate, or inadequate, yearly progress were released by the Pennsylvania Department of Education Friday, Sept. 21. The tests showed 39.1 percent of school districts statewide failed to reach benchmarks on adequate yearly progress, including scores on state math and reading tests, attendance and graduation rates.

In Allegheny County, four districts missed adequate yearly progress in 2011, but the number rose to 17 in 2012. Pittsburgh was included among the districts that did not hit the benchmark.

Erika Gold, director of the Pitt UPrep Partnership — a program that began in 2008 and pairs about 60 tutors, all current Pitt students or recent graduates, with either a single or group of Pittsburgh Public School students — said that many factors cause Pittsburgh schools not to make the grade. Financial challenges in the district causing instability in schools, continual staff turnover and student transfer, different school cultures and poorly assigned teachers all contribute to the lack of school achievement and success.

Gold said that, in the current partnership, the primary focus is on Milliones, but that tutoring support has expanded this year to other Hill District organizations, including the Pittsburgh Miller African-Centered Academy. She said that most classes throughout Milliones have tutors in them to work with students as needed, but that the number of students with a tutor can vary each day depending on student need — including one-on-one, small groups or whole-class support.

In the role of tutor, Pitt students help create a positive learning environment for the high school students by stressing the importance of striving for a college education.

Pitt Senior Ben Siegel, who assists Gold in operating the recruitment initiative, said the partnership with Pitt students is something the public schools needed. Siegel cited the inefficiencies of large and growing class sizes, which prevent students with strong academic needs from receiving adequate attention.

Siegel said that Pitt tutors make a substantial commitment of up to 10 hours of weekly volunteering while working closely with what he believes to be an “absolutely underestimated” segment of the public school population.

“A lot of service organizations at Pitt try to raise the cycle of low expectations [of public school students] because it isn’t really expected that they’ll graduate,” he said. “It’s not surprising when they fail, because it’s an institutionalized perception that it’s okay when they fail. This is a dangerous position to take, but it’s also an easy position to take, because, in reality, scores show that only something like half will pass and graduate from high school.”

To Gold, a member of the Hill District Education Council — a group composed of educators, community members, community organizations, ministers and others interested in the educational future of the Hill District — the state-set goal of 100 percent proficiency in student performance in the areas of reading and math by 2014 is unreasonable.

“The state’s goal is unrealistic, considering where we are now,” Gold said. “It is possible if some drastic changes happen, but we are talking about two years and extraordinarily low test scores.”

As an incentive for Pittsburgh public school students who strive for academic success, the Pittsburgh Promise was created, and, in 2006, Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and then-Superintendent Mark Roosevelt announced their goals for the program. The Pittsburgh Promise aims to help students afford college and draw residents to the city.

The Pittsburgh Promise is funded by corporations and foundations and began in 2008 to provide up to $40,000 per student in scholarships. Students qualify for the scholarship as long as they meet certain requirements, including minimum grade-point average, school attendance rates, residency and admission into a postsecondary institution in Pennsylvania.

In a statement on the Pittsburgh Promise website, its board declares that, for Pittsburgh Public Schools, its “bold vision is that at least 85 percent of our students will graduate from high school, and at least 80 percent of our graduates will pursue and complete some form of postsecondary education.”

According to a district report card issued by the Pennsylvania Department of Education to the Pittsburgh School District for the 2011-2012 school year, the current graduation rate is 68 percent.

To increase graduation rates and prepare students to apply for the Pittsburgh Promise, Gold said Pittsburgh public schools must continue to strive for a positive learning environment that is “conducive to understanding and learning through building relationships and having high expectations for all.”

“If a teacher doesn’t have a connection with the community or with students, then student behavior tends to follow the saying: Students don’t care what you know until they know that you care,” Gold said.

Gold said that student-and-teacher relationships, as well as tutor-and-student relationships, are crucial but can be negatively affected when teachers don’t challenge their students to rise to the occasion and succeed. This dynamic might result, she said, when teachers are “dropped” into schools due to school closings, consolidations and teacher cuts.

According to Gold, the schools are working to increase teacher effectiveness through a partnership between the teachers union and the school district. The union and district devised an evaluation system that has been looked at nationally as a teaching evaluation model.

“It takes time and years to go through this process of determining who the effective teachers are, but a lack of achieving [Adequate Yearly Progress] is partly because we are still in the process of moving ineffective teachers out of the district,” she said. “Research shows that students who are the most marginalized and underserved need the most effective teachers in their classes.”

Chew said that tutoring is important for Pitt students to develop a broader outlook and to deepen their connection with the community.

“If I didn’t [tutor], I would still be in that suburban bubble that I came from,” she said.

Gold said that the hours she spent tutoring marginalized students were the best-spent time of her week, and that University student involvement is also applicable to one’s future.

“I’ve done plenty of hiring, and, from a hiring standpoint, I can tell you that it means a lot to future employers for tutors to have this kind of work experience,” Gold said. “It can make the difference in getting hired, as it says a lot about the broader experiences and worldview and character of the applicant.”

Gold said that the Pitt Uprep Partnership still has a need for tutors and that interested students are always encouraged to contact Anna Delaney, the UPrep tutor coordinator, to get involved with the partnership.

Students who currently participate in the UPrep program testify to the effect this experience has had on their world outlook.

Siegel referenced an eye-opening experience he had during the summer discussing humanitarian efforts and water shortages in Africa with young students at a summer camp. Unsure they would respond to the issue, he was surprised when many of them engaged in brainstorming solutions to the problem.

“I left that experience thinking how with it they all were as they were caring for others in need when they had their own problems,” he said. “There is a danger in thinking of these kids as at-risk youth because, if people label them like that, the students may begin to settle for that label. But the thing is, they can think, they care for others and they can really impress you.”