High School for Law Enforcement and Public Safety
About the Practice
A special weekend assembly program is held for both boys in the ESI program and students who have failed one or more classes. Students are given written invitations in school and parents / guardians are sent letters of invitation. This special assembly takes place once in the Fall and once in the Spring. We have had similar assemblies in the past. However, this assembly was more successful because the parents attended. As a result, this raised the accountability level of both the students and parents in a non-threatening way.
Target Population/Total Students:
The target population is students who have failed one or more classes, 9th grade through 12th grade. The total population of students in our program is 100.
Challenges:
- The weather interfered and we had to re-schedule because of the snow.
- Some parents/guardians had to work and were unable to attend.
How did school overcome challenges?
- We re-scheduled the assembly for the following week. Additional messages were sent out through phone master to communicate this information to the families.
- Some families who were unable to attend due to work did reach out to the school and Ms. Malcolm arranged private meetings with those families. In addition, Ms. Malcolm extended invitations to some families who did attend, if they wanted extended one-on-one conferences.
How will you continue to sustain this practice?
We will continue this practice. Our hope is for money to be found to sustain what should be a four-year grant. However, we plan to continue our practice using professional development to work on teachers to build relationships. We will update student biographical files to contact families and to hold an ESI graduation highlighting students who excelled in the program.