A collaboration between the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Quilcene School District, WSU Jefferson County Extension and 4-HWhat was the Gates Grant?
The purpose of the Gates funding in Quilcene High school was to promote a small, personalized, technology-enriched high school that offers students an opportunity for in-depth, real world learning through community partnerships.
The high school received a HiGH TECH HIGH grant to fund computers, teacher training and enrichment programs. There was also a community grant – the Connecting Schools and Community grant administered by the WSU Center to Bridge the Digital Divide which funded more teacher training, youth entrepreneurship, community coordinators and a variety of special projects including Geographic Information Systems, video, more computers for community work, and a number of field trips and visits to college and university campuses.
Schools are funded and supported by Gates Foundation resources to help demonstrate that it is possible to help all students achieve by improving teaching and learning and enhancing access to technology.
What was the School District Doing?
Since 2002 the Quilcene School District has had a HIGH TECH HIGH grant from the Gates Foundation. The community Connecting Schools and Community grant was funded 2003-2006 to support and assist the schools’ success with their program.
Background:
The Gates Foundation wanted to invest in small schools because their research and funding of other projects demonstrated that essential to a successful High School is the opportunity for meaningful student projects that apply academic skills within the context of “real world” projects.
Through effective integration of in-school education and the community’s Connecting Schools and Communities program we set out to cooperate to address some of the most critical challenges facing youth and communities today.
Outcomes of successful projects were to be:
• Involve and empower youth, encourage youth run community projects—support youth involvement in the community in which they live.
• Reduce youth arrests, vandalism and absenteeism and demonstrate a positive increase in youth career dreams as a result of the real world community experiences.
• Promote great community school engagement and partnership, expand adult volunteerism and community service learning, increase the number of adults viewing youth positively.
• Strengthen community networks, increase adult volunteering. Expand voter support of school initiatives and funding of school projects.
• Expand community support to continue integrations of school and community learning experiences.
• Increase student achievement measured by the percentage of youth graduating from high school and attending college.
What Were the Students Doing?
Students were working directly with teachers to improve education.
Students from Quilcene High School were invited to sit down directly with teachers and participate in defining what excellence in education would look like for their programs. Students helped identify gaps, challenges, and worked directly with professional mentors and trainers to describe how the high school program could work better. Among their recommendations was more challenging coursework, more variety in programs, strong partnerships with the community, and higher expectations of their performance.
“You have to understand, we’ve been in school with each other every day since the first grade. There is very little chance for us to try out new behaviors, take risks. But we have to learn to do it”.