SEARCH RESULTS

Complete a survey based on the Back on Track model to better understand how your program/school maps to the three phases and what may be needed to improve your students’ graduation rates and college readiness.

Texas's Rio Grande Valley is home to a groundbreaking model for dropout recovery (based on the Back on Track Through College model) that helps youth transition into college. The College, Career, and Technology Academy has graduated almost 1,000 former dropouts and off-track youth in five years — a significant percentage of whom attained postsecondary credits before graduating — putting college success within reach for students who once left school without a diploma or were at high risk of not graduating. This approach is being replicated across the Southwest, as other school districts recognize the promise and potential of recovering this population and helping them achieve their postsecondary and career goals.

Despite growing interest in student-centered approaches to learning, educators have few places to turn for a comprehensive account of key components of this emerging field. Students at the Center aims to build the knowledge base for these innovative approaches that beat the odds for underserved students, and improve learning and achievement. This project includes 9 papers and additional resources on student-centered learning.

This brief by Youth Development Institute, for JFF, seeks to build an understanding of the needs and strengths of young people who are underrepresented in higher education and the ways that youth development organizations and colleges can collaborate to improve student success.

This tool (abridged version) helps districts and their partners to develop a reengagement and recruitment strategy. A more in-depth tool is available upon request.

This tool helps districts and their partners to develop a reengagement and recruitment strategy.

Bringing Off-Track Youth in the Center of High School Reform provides a "starter kit" for school districts seeking to introduce a systemic approach to dropout prevention and recovery. This tool kit supports the efforts of a school district and its partners to create a system of back-on-track options for off-track and out-of-school youth. It focuses on key decision points in identifying young people who are falling off track and on creating high-quality learning environments to help them reengage and graduate college-ready.

This web-based tool examines the alternative education policies of all 50 states and the District of Columbia and aligned those with seven model policy elements that define a new alternative education policy set.

This online tool identifies six policy elements that underpin a holistic state-level policy approach to dropout prevention and recovery. Find out about these elements and which states’ are making progress to achieve them.

The Optional Flexible School Day Program (OFSDP), enacted in 2007-08, is a non-competitive grant program that provides Texas districts with an alternative method of calculating attendance by lifting restrictions on the days of week, hours and locations that students can attend classes and the locations where instruction can take place. Tips, FAQs, and places for additional information and help in using OFSDP are included in this document.

Pharr-San Juan-Alamo partnered with South Texas College to create the College, Career, and Technology Academy (CCTA), a college-connected dropout recovery school that puts former dropouts onto a supported path to postsecondary education.

Changing the Landscape describes work in communities and states designed to develop a systemic approach to expanding learning options and improving outcomes for students who are struggling or who have left school.

This report describes the work of Project U-Turn, a citywide collaborative campaign that focuses public attention on the dropout crisis and designs strategies and leverages investments to resolve it.

This study examines promising strategies to reengage low-income disconnected young people and how to take these strategies to scale.

A national survey and research report released by America’s Promise Alliance, Civic Enterprises and Peter D. Hart Research Associates. This survey sought to better understand how “disconnected youth” or “opportunity youth,” became detached from school and work and the challenges they face trying to reconnect to society. Based on the findings from this survey, this report provides a glimpse of the enormous benefits to the nation if we could re-engage these young people and what would be most helpful in getting them back on track.