A student walks down Billy Henderson Stadium during Clarke Central High School’s class of 2021 graduation on May 22, 2021. After an increase in failure rates in classes from the first semester of the 2021-22 school year compared to previous years, ideas to increase success in students were created, to help more students reach graduation. “What we’re looking at (are) students who potentially will be not successful and drop out and so how do we help them (pass)? That’s kind of the big question,” Assistant Principal Summer Smith said. Photo by Chloe Sears
Efforts to help struggling seniors and freshmen pass the 2021-22 school year are underway.
After an increase in failure rates during the first semester of the 2021-22 school year compared to previous academic years, the CCHS administrative team has been formulating plans to help students who are close to failing a class.
“In order to increase the graduation rate, we need to make sure our kids are successful with their courses, (but) our ninth graders are somewhat struggling, and some of our seniors are struggling,” Principal Dr. Swade Huff said. “(We’ve started to) monitor attendance, behavior and academic performance (of those students).”
“In order to increase the graduation rate, we need to make sure our kids are successful with their courses, (but) our ninth graders are somewhat struggling, and some of our seniors are struggling.”
— Dr. Swade Huff,
Principal
In order to help students pass their classes, there has been a lot of discussion among the administrative team on ways to support students. According to Assistant Principal Summer Smith, the cause of the issue is rooted in the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on academic performance.
“The last time freshmen (had a) normal (school year) was seventh grade (due to the pandemic). I think freshmen, in general, come to high school and don’t understand (that) the leap from middle school to ninth grade is a very vast one,” Smith said. “(As for the) seniors, (those) who are on track are fine. It’s the seniors who are kind of in that gray area (that are struggling). I think they start to lose hope and they lose focus and they give up.”
In efforts to help motivate both the freshmen and seniors, Smith and Huff have discussed ideas of partnering students with staff members to act as a mentor. For the 2022-23 school year, there are plans to start offering resources for incoming freshmen to help prevent this issue in the future.
“We can always use more support. We’ve discussed next year maybe adding a pure leadership course, (and that is a) course that we may offer for our freshmen next year to help them to start off (their) high school career with a strong foundation,” Huff said.
