Tech Offers Head Start to Young Students|Southern Education Desk 6-20-2012
College preparedness is a concept that’s getting a lot of attention. In Louisiana some students are getting a head start. Louisiana Tech is guiding a group of high achieving students just out of high school into summer university coursework. These summer classes represent a critical period of adjustment for these students.
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Louisiana Tech Summer Scholars, Mason McCrary & Zach Parrott |
A group of 45 newly enrolled teenagers are taking summer classes at the university.
Mason McCrary just graduated from high school, but he hopes eventually to fly for a major airline. And he’s already taking aviation courses to get a jump on his upcoming class schedule.
“The good thing about the summer is that I’m more prepared for the fall. I’m not just going to jump in like other students. I’m going to have a good base. I know people. I know my professors, and it’s going to be a lot easier in the fall.”
In what it calls its Summer Scholars and Summer Enrichment curricula, Louisiana Tech offers college courses to high school graduates with an ACT score of 23 or higher, and to high school students who are between their junior and senior years with a GPA of 3.0 or better.
A Pressing Need to Improve College Preparedness
These specialized curricula may help students make the difficult leap from high school to college. The Washington-based non-profit organization, Complete College America, found that, based on the number of students who enroll in remedial courses, 41% of university freshmen arrive on campus unprepared to make the transition.
Joan Edinger is Tech’s interim director of admissions. She says the Summer Scholars program also offers students the opportunity to get a feel for the total college experience in small classes, without the pressures of a full course-load.
A Supportive and Challenging Post-Secondary Environment
“Not only are they in college level classes, they’re also in the residence hall; they’re interacting with other students. So that brings them to another level of maturity.”
Edinger says most students prosper in this atmosphere.
Still, not every student is prepared to make the jump. Gary Odom is the head of Tech’s aviation department. He says his fifteen years as an instructor working with students just out of high school have revealed a pattern.
“In our academic area, which is pretty technical, I would say thirty to thirty-five percent will end up going to a different academic area or not finishing college that start our program.”
Odom says students’ immaturity can work against them.
“I notice that sometimes they haven’t done a lot of academic work at home. It’s all been in the classroom in high schools. And they’re not used to having homework or having to study a whole lot outside of class, and sometimes it just doesn’t work for them like it did in high school.”
And it’s not just the academics. Interim orientation director Andy Cline says students also struggle with family pressures.
“The most difficult task, I feel, is for a parent to let go. And it’s difficult to send a junior in high school who’s going into their senior year, who’s not 18 to an entirely different atmosphere of college life at a university.”
Zach Parrott began taking freshman courses at Tech May 31. He says the decision to leave his home just outside New Orleans caused some tension.
“My dad was like, let him go. My mom calls me every day, sends me pictures of the dog, ‘oh, he misses you.’”
Parrott says that being separated from his family has put a crimp in traditional lines of support.
“I can’t exactly just walk into the house and say ‘hey dad, I’ve got a problem can you help me with it?’ I’ve actually got to call him up and then he’s got to talk me through it. And that’s if I can actually get a hold of him.”
Mason McCrary says succeeding on a slate of advanced placement classes in high school has eased the academic leap. But he had to spend some time convincing his mom that making an early transition to university was a good idea.
“I’m the youngest child and I guess she just didn’t want her youngest child leaving so early. She wanted me for another year but she let me go this year and I’m glad she did.”
Despite the familial strains, McCrary and Parrott are enthusiastic about their academic prospects. Both students plan to continue and complete their undergraduate degrees at Louisiana Tech. And starting early may just give them the leg up they need to succeed.
Air Date:
Thu, 06/21/2012