Sunday, November 23, 2008
Program offers children hope of an education
Dan Radmacher
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From the RoundTable blog
I may have to rethink my preference for electing school board members rather than appointing them.
Roanoke appoints its school board members, which I thought was an oddity when I first moved here.
I've met a lot of elected school board members in a lot of different communities over the years. Most have been diligent and dedicated, voluntarily taking on what has to be the single most thankless elected position in the nation.
But I have never come across a board full of members willing to give so much time, energy and personal commitment as this one.
Maybe this is unusual for Roanoke. Or perhaps the board members, seeing the sad state city schools are in, have simply risen to the occasion.
Whatever the case, Roanokers should be proud. If ever given a chance to elect board members, citizens should aspire to building a board as excellent as the current one.
The latest good work to emerge from the board is the Roanoke Community College Access Program, a partnership with Virginia Western Community College, area foundations and area businesses that will offer public high school students a free community college education if they attend Roanoke schools at least their last two years and graduate with at least a 2.0 grade point average.
This may seem like a strange and inopportune time to launch a major, expensive initiative -- especially one that involves asking businesses and foundations, much less a city government facing major cutbacks from the state, for substantial financial commitments.
But it's an important project that, in the long run, could improve Roanoke's dismal graduation rate while simultaneously substantially improving its workforce.
Businesses apparently see the need. Already, several are stepping up with five-year commitments. The Roanoke Women's Foundation gave the largest grant it has ever awarded -- $100,000 -- to the program.
Virginia Western President Robert Sandel told us in a recent editorial board meeting that, even in today's economic conditions, jobs are going unfilled in Roanoke because workers cannot be found with the appropriate skills.
"We consider ourselves a workforce institution," he said. Roanoke city's dropout rates make it hard to train the workers the city's employers need.
While a high school diploma used to be sufficient for many jobs, more opportunities these days require at least a two-year degree or some sort of technical certification.
As the cost of higher education soars, even a more affordable community college education can seem out of reach to students and their families. Despair comes easily. Despair often leads to drop-outs.
This program offers a reason for Roanoke's students to work hard and graduate by giving them the means to obtain a higher education.
As board member Jason Bingham pointed out, 67 percent of Roanoke's students qualify for free or reduced lunch. Many have never known anything but poverty.
"That sucks your hope away," he said. This program, if the school system follows through and hammers home to kids at a very early age the need to work for the opportunity, could change that.
Perhaps it already is. Bingham told of a young child who approached Superintendent Rita Bishop at a school meeting as word of the program spread and asked, "Dr. Bishop, is it true? Is it true I get to go to college?"
That's the sound of hope, the sound of a child who will be more likely to see the reasons to work hard and do what it takes to graduate with good grades.
Radmacher is the editorial page editor of The Roanoke Times.
