Students, parents and educators looking for information about the N.C. Learn and Earn program on the Web will find videos of several Montgomery County Schools (MCS) students, telling how they’ve benefited from the program. And, unless they end up on the cutting room floor, MCS AIG and Distance Learning Coordinator Beth Blake and West Montgomery student Phone Keosouma will be on UNC Public Television in a documentary about the award winning program to be aired this spring.
Last August, because MCS was one of a relatively few school systems using Learn and Earn Online, representatives were invited to a luncheon with then Governor Easley. “They asked if we had a student with a good success story and Phone was invited to tell his story,” Blake explained. “He’d gotten behind in his efforts to graduate on time and through taking online classes was able to catch up.”
From there, Keosouma and Blake were invited to a meeting in Fayetteville. Although they didn’t know it until they arrived, the session included filming for the Harvard University-produced documentary about N.C. Learn and Earn, which received the 2008 Innovations in American Government Award from the Ash Institute at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. The N.C. program was selected from nearly 1,000 applicants to represent the best in government innovation and brought the state a $100,000 grant.
MCS students are involved in Learn and Earn Online, taking college courses online at no cost, that allows them to earn college credits as well as high school graduation credits. This semester, 94 West Montgomery students are taking 159 distance learning classes through Learn and Earn, Huskins or iSchool, which earn college credit, as well as N.C. Virtual Public School for high school credits. At East Montgomery, which started the program a semester after West, 69 students are taking a total of 132 classes.
A recent visit to the online labs at both schools found students logged on to classes at Montgomery Community College and UNC-Greensboro. iSchool courses will soon be expanded to include classes from East Carolina University and N.C. State. The iSchool classes are open to juniors and seniors, while the MCC classes are available for qualified students in grades nine through 12.
West freshman Jhansi Nandipati was posting input to the class discussion group for American Women’s Studies at MCC. Like other first-time online students, she’s allowed to take only one class her first semester, to see if she can handle the work and independence needed. “I turned in my first paper a couple of weeks ago and did pretty well,” she said.” She likes the opportunity to take classes on line. “It’s good, especially if people don’t have money for college; it will help them pay less,” she explained.
Seniors Adam Elkins, Derrick Richardson and Drew Swan are taking multiple classes including Psychology, Music Appreciation, Social Issues, Cultural Anthropology and Physical Fitness for Life, a health class. Depending on their course loads, they will have anywhere from six to 12 of their general education college credits by the time they graduate from West.
“I like getting the college credit, but it’s hard keeping up with all the reading and work,” Elkins said.
All the students gave credit to Robyn Stone, West’s distance learning advisor, who like her counterpart at East, Darlene Chappell, doesn’t help with course content questions but helps them with technology issues when submitting work to their college instructors and assists students with time management and study skills. The advisors are also in frequent contact with the colleges for student progress reports.
“They really emphasize to us that this is a privilege, not a right, to be able to take these classes,” added Swan.
At East, junior Carson Martin was watching a film for his Masterpieces of Cinema class, while senior Mary Smith and junior Brandy Furr were working on MCC’s New Testament course.
Smith, who expects to have 15 college credits by graduation, said, “I like having more independence and it’s easy to keep up. I’m actually ahead a little and use free time at home to get ahead.”
Junior Joshua Jenkins is taking two MCC classes, Introduction to Business and American History II. He has eight papers due this semester and was working on the third one. “It’s a lot more work than high school, especially all the papers and the length of the papers,” he said. His MCC history instructor Bill Maher has high expectations of all his students and requires extensive writing.
Junior Darrick Pratt is taking two classes this term, Social Problems and Cultural Anthropology. “I want to get at least 20 college credits and also graduate from high school early,” he said. “I want to be a psychologist and help people.”
Pratt is one of nine MCS students selected for the Learn and Earn Ambassador program. “The governor assigned us to help explain what Learn and Earn is about, how easy it can be and to be an example for other students,” he said.
He’s already convinced two other students to try Learn and Earn and with the other ambassadors led a local parent workshop in October to educate them about the program and solicit their input on ways to publicize Learn and Earn. The ambassadors also went to Raleigh to speak to the legislative Joint Education Committee last fall.
Blake spoke about her pride in seeing the ambassadors learn and grow through their experiences. One student, Daniel Corrall, noting that a number of parents at the workshop spoke Spanish, volunteered to translate and help them. “That’s the kind of leadership we’re looking for,” Blake said.
The program has not been without problems since it started in spring 2008. “It took a while to get the kinks ironed out between Learn and Earn and MCS, and our early success rate was low,” Blake said.
Technology problems were addressed and Blake and Phillip Brown worked with 54 students the first summer, contacting them once a week about their work. Those efforts, as well as putting Stone and Chappell into the distance learning labs have resulted in the success rate, students earning Cs or higher, jumping from below 40 percent at the start to 94 percent in the fall 2008 semester.
Blake had high praise for everyone involved, from Kathy Harris, director of student services at MCC, to MCS school staff and central office administrators for bringing Learn and Earn to MCS students and doing everything they can to make the program work.
“This has opened the door to everybody,” said Blake. “There’s no excuse now not to graduate from high school without at least one college class. Everything they need is here for them.”
