City Year believes education has the power to help every child reach his or her potential. However, in high-poverty communities there are external factors and obstacles students are faced with every day that can interfere with their ability to both get to school and be ready and able to learn. But it’s these students who need a bit of extra, individualized support. But there’s a gap between the kind of help they need and the support the schools are designed to provide. America’s schools are designed to provide extra support to just 15% of students. But in many high- poverty communities, 50% or more students require additional support academic, social, or emotional support. emotional support. The result of this gap is a shockingly high dropout rate in high-poverty communities. And when a student drops out of school, it not only affects him or her, it also has a lasting effect on our communities and society as a whole.
This is where City Year comes in!
City Year partners with at-risk schools to help bridge the gap between what their students need and what the schools are designed to provide. In doing so, they’re helping students reach their full potential and graduate high school in communities all across America. Through their data-driven approach and by coming together with partners and schools, City Year is continuing to make a measurable impact in the lives of the students and communities they serve.
Their progress can be attributed to a unique, holistic approach, which they call Whole School Whole Child. It’s based around a group of carefully selected, highly trained young adults— corps members—who provide individualized support to at-risk students, while also establishing an overall positive learning environment in the school. It’s their dedication and hard work that’s helping students reach their full potential, while also having a positive effect on the community as a whole.
To identify the students who need their help the most, they partner with the schools and districts and look for those who are more at risk of dropping out than their peers. They do this using an approach based on research from Johns Hopkins University.
Students who shows just one of these signs as early as sixth grade has only a 25% percent chance of graduating high school on time with their peers. However, if a student reaches the 10th grade on track and on time, he or she has a 75% chance of graduating. That’s why they try to reach these students early—specifically, during third through ninth grade— and provide them with one-on-one support to help them overcome the challenges they face both in and out of school.
To work with the students directly, City Year relies on the energy and dedication of their Corps members-a diverse group of educated, young adults who serve full-time for 10 months in City Year’s partner schools to provide extra support for students, teachers, and the school. City Year AmeriCorps members handle a tremendous amount of responsibility right from the beginning. Even before the school year starts, teams of corps members are placed in City Year’s partner schools to meet with school administrators and develop student focus lists—based on the ABCs—so that they can start reaching out to the students they’ll be serving. When it’s time to work directly with the students Corps members are there for them in each and every way. Here are just a few things that corps members do throughout the school day…