Opportunity for All
“When challenged, Americans have always opted for expanding the circle of opportunity, enlarging our freedom, and providing equality of opportunity.”
—Excerpt from The CollegeKeys Compact™, open letter to the leaders of American education from the Board of Trustees of the College Board
The College Board is committed to the principle that all students deserve an opportunity to participate in rigorous and academically challenging courses and programs and to have access to college upon graduation. And while recent research shows that more young people are aspiring to attend college and take challenging and advanced courses, some of the numbers are cause for concern. These challenges frame our work now and in the future.
A few of the findings:
- Roughly one-third of all students do not complete high school, and for African American and Hispanic students, the number is more than 4 in 10.
- Another third who do graduate from high school are not prepared to enter postsecondary education.
- Of the third that do enter postsecondary education, 46 percent are required to take remedial courses and only 6 percent of young people from the lowest socioeconomic rankings earn a four-year college degree.
- High school dropouts are twice as likely as their graduating classmates to slip into poverty.
(Closing the Graduation Gap: Toward High Schools That Prepare All Students for College, Work, and Citizenship, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, April 2003)
The work of the College Board over many years has demonstrated that statistics like these can be improved through the use of research-based programs, services, and comprehensive models for school reform like those provided by the College Readiness Systems.
See how the College Readiness Systems can help: