Copeland-Morgan Addresses Historically Black Colleges and Universities

Youlonda Copeland-Morgan, the chair of the College Board’s Board of Trustees, addressed the opening session of the 21st annual Historically Black Colleges and Universities conference in Atlanta on Sept. 27. This year’s conference was centered on the mission of the CollegeKeys Compact™ — “Getting Ready, Getting In, Getting Through.” Expanding on that theme, Copeland-Morgan implored participants to make the necessary sacrifices and do the difficult work to improve the preparation, college-entry rates and graduation rates of low-income, first-generation and minority students.

In order to remove barriers to college, Copeland-Morgan, who is also associate vice president for enrollment management and director of scholarships and student aid at Syracuse University, said that we have to first challenge our beliefs about who is capable of advanced learning and who has the ability to succeed in America’s schools. Low expectations are the first barrier to college preparation. She cited Martin Luther King Jr., a graduate of Morehouse College and Atlanta’s most famous native son, who spent his life talking about the necessity of raising the bar when it came to learning. King said, “Intelligence plus character, that is the goal of true education.”

Copeland-Morgan encouraged everyone to keep the bar high as they respond to the challenges they face, “I want to encourage you to keep pressing toward the higher mark,” she said. “Don’t let anyone tell you that we can’t make a difference, that we can’t change a school or a school district, that you can’t impact your colleges and universities. Don’t let the naysayers, the politicians, the media or anyone else tell you that we cannot change education in America. We can do whatever we set our hearts and minds to do. We need to resolve that we are going to tackle these issues of low expectations, of low performance, of low standards, of low acceptance rates and of low graduation rates. … We must be serious about raising the bar in education, especially for black and brown children in this country.”

She reminded her audience of the historical changes that have recently taken place in our nation’s capital , with the election of Barack Obama, the first biracial president, and the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic to serve on the Supreme Court. Both Obama and Sotomayor rose from humble beginnings to their current stations through educational achievement. And education improves the quality of life for everyone. Citing a recent McKinsey study, she pointed out that New York students in the top quarter in math in eighth grade had a 40 percent higher median income 12 years later than students who were in the bottom quarter.

Copeland-Morgan spoke about the changing global competition that is sending U.S. companies overseas to find better-skilled laborers in China, India, Russia, Eastern Europe, Latin America and Central Asia. The days when America was the world leader in high school and college completion rates are a thing of the past. The U.S. now ranks 18th among 24 industrialized nations in high school graduation rates and 14th in college completion rates. She explained that, for the first time in history, this country is producing a generation of young people less educated than their parents. This growing education deficit is a grave threat to our country’s future and to our nation’s well being. It is imperative that the percentage of students going to and completing college increase significantly over the next 10 to 15 years. President Obama expects that by 2025, about 55 percent of students will have completed a postsecondary degree within six years.

She said the McKinsey study also identified a racial achievement gap, with black and Latino students, on average, two to three years behind white students of the same age. The National Assessment of Educational Progress scores for math and reading across the fourth and eighth grades place 48 percent of blacks and 43 percent of Latinos “below basic,” compared to only 17 percent of white students. Another study by the Educational Trust shows that approximately 60 percent of blacks and Latinos graduate from high school on time, compared to 81 percent of white students. And just 26 percent of African Americans and 18 percent of Latino Americans have at least an associate degree. Couple this with the changing socioeconomic demographics in our nation, where we know that America’s school children will increasingly come from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and will be disproportionately students of color.

“Closing this racial achievement gap is crucial,” said Copeland-Morgan. “Not only to the lives of these young people, but also to closing the global degree gap, as people of color will account for ALL of the growth in college degrees between now and 2020. In fact, it’s been estimated that eliminating graduation disparities between minorities and whites would yield more than half of the degrees needed to achieve our 55 percent goal.”

Improving these graduation rates means following the tenets of the CollegeKeys Compact — ensuring that students are prepared for college, removing the many barriers to getting into college and providing the necessary support to help them get through college. Copeland-Morgan announced that 535 members — representing colleges, schools, systems of higher education, school districts, agencies and associations in all regions of the country — have already signed on to the CollegeKeys Compact and committed to its provisions. She encouraged every institution to get on board.

She then challenged attendees to go beyond the commitments in the Compact. “As education leaders, I’m hoping you will lend your voices and prestige to the vision it lays out … to raising the bar not just in your own organizations, but in Congress, with your state legislators and education agencies and even in your hometown school districts. We can change the outcomes, but it’s going to require all of us to do things differently. We can’t afford incremental change. There’s too much at stake. We need transformational change.”

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Orlando Teacher Discusses Current Issues in Education

Orlando art teacher Gloria Gonzalez

Gloria Gonzalez, an art teacher at Jones High School in Orlando, Fla., was one of eight teachers featured in a new report just released from the College Board and Phi Delta Kappa International. Teachers Are the Center of Education: Profiles of Eight Teachers salutes the work and importance of teachers and offers insights on current issues in education from eight outstanding teachers, selected for their dedication to students, and commitment to their profession and to excellence in education.

The report serves both to confirm what is publically acknowledged — that teachers are at the center of education — and to note the challenges teachers face in today’s schools. Nominated by College Board members and staff, the teachers, who epitomize the profession’s most admirable qualities, represent a diverse set of disciplines, locations, types of schools and student populations.

The words of these eight teachers will help all who hear them to chart a “partial road map for changes in
public policy,” as Arlene Ackerman, superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia, wrote in the
report’s foreword.

For Gonzalez, art is everywhere. As she works to instill that understanding in her students, she connects her courses to the rest of the curriculum to strengthen her students’ problem-solving skills so they see art as part of a larger academic tradition. Gonzalez was selected because of her resolve to broaden her students’ perspectives and help them learn the additional arts of self-confidence and perseverance.

“Like so many excellent teachers out there, Gloria inspires students to achieve — to want more for themselves and to require it of themselves — and that is the essence of this project,” said Gaston Caperton, president of the College Board. “It’s good for the public to get a glimpse of what’s right about public education, and we believe that starts with the most crucial force in learning: our teachers.”

Ackerman added, “In words that we can all understand, these eight teachers from different backgrounds, teaching different subjects to different kinds of students under different circumstances, provide a human voice and real-life context for the policies we must work to implement.”

To read Teachers Are the Center of Education in its entirety, go to www.collegeboard.com/teacheradvocacy.

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A Note from Southern Region VP Jenny Krugman

VP Jenny Krugman

If you passed through Baltimore this past month, you would find, in addition to the Chesapeake and lump meat crab cakes, a gathering of more than 5,300 National Association for College Admission Counseling members. Meeting with college admission counselors, university enrollment managers and high school counselors were members of our higher education team. The key discussion topic at most meetings was financial aid — how to make it equitable and how to bring all aspiring students into the financial aid fold.

Points of focus guide our financial aid work. We advise that, during these fiscally challenging months and years, all students should apply for aid. Note that not all aid applications are the same, and awards vary by college. Students should compare award letters on multiple criteria.

Our team was also busy offering 35 workshops to more than 2,800 K–12 school counselors and district leaders. These Fall Counselor Workshops — presented at locations from Roanoke, Va., to New Orleans — brought educators up to date on College Board programs and services. A new on-demand opportunity allows educators to attend these workshops online and free of charge. Live standing-room-only counselor audiences were matched by hundreds of online participants. One school counselor wrote, “On your website, I found the answer to every question I had . . . and then found answers beyond those questions.”

Got Forum? Join us Oct. 21–23 for the College Board’s Forum 2009 in New York. A special breakfast for members of the Southern Region will be held 7:30–8:30 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 22. Come meet your regional council members as well as past, present and future council leaders Patricia Guillory, Libby Brookshire, Antonio Boyle, Mildred Johnson and Michael Shackleford, and celebrate the successes of students across our region. Also on Thursday, from 3:45 to 5 p.m., join members of the Alabama and Florida leadership teams to hear Alabama State Superintendent Joseph Morton and Florida State Commissioner of Education Eric Smith share their successes and offer how-tos for using legislation and state accountability to build educational wins for their states’ students.

From the Forum to financial aid and NACAC attendance to Fall Counselor Workshop presentations, we strive to support your mission.

Events & Workshops

Click here to see events and workshops in the Southern Region.

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