LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — This school year, 15,000 students at 18 underperforming schools across the Las Vegas valley are getting a boost with a feeder program to improve grades, graduation rates, and help them find careers.
To help teens progress through high school and graduate, education leaders explain how the work begins as early as elementary school.
On Saturday at Western High, educators and state leaders came for the official launch of the Feeder Program among 18 schools; the program also spans to Desert Pines High and the various middle and elementary schools in their communities.
The project is a collaboration between CCEA and CCSD, and received 247,000 in a grant from the Nevada Department of Education, through Senate Bill 460.
To help students who are falling behind or need remedial support, teachers are getting extra professional development and training; the “pillars” of the program focus on pre-K, early literacy, middle school math, and workforce and college readiness. Schools can create programs for students, or even invest in after-school tutoring.
Teachers said the principal and staff at Western High have worked to help teens who are falling behind or are far behind; they are also at risk of not graduating.
“The system has not been working for a really long time. and so the question comes up all the time for us: what is the change?” said Abigail Johnson, who leads and teaches English at Western High.
“We have 52-minute class periods on our campus. I think it can become really easy to work on, like, a lesson and not really know how to ensure that students are actually engaged. Focusing on things like the Way of Warriors discourse allows us to ensure that, like, from the bell ringing to the end bell, what we are doing is actually working to see where students are at, that they’re actually understanding what we’re talking about,” Johnson said.
Families said extra help can prepare students for advanced courses in high school, help them hone interest in sports or clubs, and then prepare them to think about paths for a career.
“These supports that are going in there and to help them are going to be game changers,” said CCEA President Kristan Nigro.
Governor Joe Lombardo told the audience that he promises that the pilot program would become a permanent program.
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