High Schools That Work

 Is An Enhanced Design to Get All Students to Standards
 

High Schools That Work (HSTW) is an effort-based school improvement initiative founded on the conviction that most students can master rigorous academic and career/technical studies if school leaders and teachers create an environment that motivates students to make the effort to succeed. HSTW is the nation’s first large-scale effort to engage state, district and school leaders in partnerships with teachers, students, parents and the community to raise student achievement in high school and the middle grades. It is based on the simple belief that most students become “smarter” through effort and hard work. School leaders and teachers can motivate students to achieve at high levels when they:

􀂄 expand students’ opportunities to learn a rigorous academic core with either a career/technical or academic concentration that is taught in ways that enable students to see the usefulness of what they have been asked to learn.
􀂄 create supportive relationships between students and adults. These relationships involve providing students with the extra help needed to meet challenging course standards and with the support to make successful transitions from the middle grades to high school and from high school to postsecondary studies and careers.
􀂄 work as teacher advisers with parents and students to set goals and to help students take the right courses that prepare them for postsecondary studies and careers.
􀂄 focus school leadership on supporting what and how teachers teach by providing common planning time and professional development aligned with school improvement plans.
 

In this environment, more students will recognize that high school matters to their future and more students will become independent learners able to set future educational and career goals and choose which courses to take to achieve those goals. In an era of rising workplace requirements, getting a good high school education that counts is more important now than ever before. To address these issues, the HSTW school improvement design provides a framework of Goals, Key Practices and Key Conditions for accelerating learning and setting higher standards. (SREB, 2006)