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Innovative approaches preparing students for the future
Several schools in the Milwaukee metro region are helping students: Envision possible career paths; experience what life is like in a professional setting; and prepare for a future in the working world.
CRISTO REY JESUIT HIGH SCHOOL
The first Cristo Rey school was founded in Chicago in 1996, and it became a model for what is now a national network of Catholic, Jesuit high schools that educate students of limited financial means. Cristo Rey Jesuit High School Milwaukee opened its doors in 2015 and today is home to nearly 400 students who participate in a unique workstudy program that serves as the cornerstone for Cristo Rey schools around the country. With growing enrollment, the school has announced plans to move to a new, larger location on National Avenue.
Students work five days a month at businesses in the greater Milwaukee area. Students get real-world work experience, a vision of potential future careers, and a burgeoning professional network beginning in their freshman year. Fees paid to Cristo Rey by the more than 75 Milwaukee area businesses who sponsor students help defray the cost of each student’s education. It works: Each year, 100 percent of Cristo Rey Jesuit graduates are accepted to 2- and 4-year colleges.
"We recognize that finding qualified, work-prepared employees is critical to the long-term viability of area businesses,” says Andrew Stith, president of Cristo Rey Jesuit High School Milwaukee. “We are proud to partner with over 75 businesses, large and small, in an effort to meet the ever-growing need for a diverse, educated future workforce for Milwaukee."
Andrew Stith - President of Cristo Rey Jesuit High School Milwaukee
PATHWAYS HIGH SCHOOL
www.pathwayshigh.org
Pathways High, a public charter high school located on the corner of 4th and Walnut in downtown Milwaukee, has drawn a diverse mix of students from urban and suburban areas. At Pathways High, students learn primarily through a project-based model.
Classes are organized into nine-week, interdisciplinary seminars that include real-world (IMPACT) experiences, life skill development and the creation of “artifacts” – work products providing evidence of content and skill mastery. These artifacts often take the place of traditional written tests.
Most seminars culminate in a final project that demonstrates students' understanding of learning objectives and application of content knowledge. Two - three times a year, students present their projects to the school and broader community during live public exhibitions. School officials believe public presentations of work to authentic audiences provide real world rigor and increased accountability, incentivizing students to do their best work.
"I'm proud of the real-world experiences we are providing to Pathways High students,” says Julia Burns, Pathways High co-founder and board president. “Together with our business and
community partners, we are developing a pipeline of exceptional young adults who want to remain in Milwaukee because they are connected to opportunities here. We're just getting started, though, and we need more businesses of all sizes to engage with our students so I encourage you to contact us.”
MPS SCHOOLS ADOPT CAREER-FOCUSED NAF FRAMEWORK
https://naf.org
Several Milwaukee Public Schools have adopted a career-focused educational framework made available through NAF, a national non-profit formerly known as the National Academy Foundation. Within MPS, NAF academies are small learning communities organized around one of five career themes: finance, hospitality and tourism, information technology, health sciences or engineering. In addition to their core courses, students who are members of a NAF academy take industry-specific classes and participate in work-based learning activities through established industry partnerships. Activities include career days, tours and industry visits, mentoring, job shadowing, project evaluation and part-time job or internship opportunities. NAF says its model of work-based learning “brings the classroom to the workplace and the workplace to the classroom” to help students establish a well-rounded skill set that includes the soft skills needed to succeed in college and the working world.
MPS schools using this framework include Ronald W. Reagan High (health sciences); Bay View High School (engineering, with plans to add a hospitality and tourism theme); James Madison Academic Campus (finance, health sciences and hospitality and tourism); North Division High School (health sciences and information technology); South Division High School (health sciences); and Washington High School of Information Technology (information technology and hospitality and tourism.)
"NAF's framework requires schools to have an advisory board of leading professionals for each career theme,” says Mike Roemer, principal of Ronald W. Reagan High. “The NAF Advisory Boards are critical in supporting student learning and opportunities while also creating a sustainable local pipeline for Milwaukee.”
MILWAUKEE EXCELLENCE
www.mkeexcellence.org
Milwaukee Excellence is a charter school authorized by MPS, serving students in sixth grade through high school. The school’s curriculum, which includes coding and computer science, is designed with the goal of 100 percent of students being accepted to college. Two years in, the school already is touting gains in closing the achievement gap for students from underrepresented backgrounds with improvement in math and English/language arts test scores. The school was founded by Maurice Thomas, a Milwaukee native who was named Teach for America’s teacher of the year in 2010.
"A rigorous college preparatory education is a right for all students,” Thomas says. “We reject the notion that incredible academic results take time to produce in schools. After two years, we're the highest rated school in the city of Milwaukee and the 23rd ranked school in the state according to DPI."
Milwaukee Excellence founder Maurice Thomas
TEALS
Microsoft Philanthropies’ TEALS (Technology Education and Literacy in Schools) helps high schools throughout the U.S. and British Columbia, Canada build and grow sustainable computer science programs. TEALS is the only companydriven program that puts technology professionals from across the industry into classrooms to team-teach computer science with classroom teachers. Through TEALS, technology professionals share their knowledge with teachers while students benefit from learning how computer science is used in the workplace. Industry volunteers and partner teachers create a ripple effect, impacting the students they teach, and the many students who will study CS in the future.
TEALS exists because many high schools want to offer computer science, but most don’t have teachers trained to teach it. To help fill the gap, TEALS works to equip teachers with the knowledge to effectively teach computer science. TEALS provides a short-term solution to the teacher shortage and helps schools build a longterm solution and sustainable computer science program by partnering teachers new to the topic with industry volunteers who have computer science content expertise. Teachers in these partnerships learn computer science while teamteaching with volunteers until they are comfortable teaching independently.
TEALS offers three models of volunteer support (co-teaching, lab support, classroom enrichment) and four different curricula (Intro to Computer Science; AP Computer Science A; AP Computer Science Principles; Advanced Topics and Projects in Computer Science) depending on the needs of the particular teacher and/or district. Strong partnerships are needed with schools who need CS teachers and the business community who supply the industry volunteers. School recruitment for the next school year happens in the fall and volunteer recruitment happens in the spring.
TEALS is currently supporting seven Milwaukee area high schools and anticipates increasing that number for the ‘19-’20 school year.
