State lags in college-bound students
Sarah Jane TribbleCONTRA COSTA TIMES
As college acceptance letters begin landing in mail boxes across the East Bay this month, Sheila Welsh carefully watches her door at College Park High in Pleasant Hill.
The college and career coordinator gleefully boasts about students walking in with letters from an array of state colleges, private schools and even one this year from the University of Pennsylvania business school.
"We have some great students here," she oozes -- and then in the same breath admits its difficult to help all of the school's more than 2,000 students.
Welsh, who struggles to keep up with an overwhelming number of students, faces challenges emphasized in a University of California study released Wednesday that highlights the low number of seniors going to four-year colleges.
California seniors are half as likely to go directly to a four-year school as students in states like New York and Massachusetts, according to the California Educational Opportunity Report, which analyzed data from the state Education Department and the state's post-secondary education commission.
To put it more bleakly, Mississippi is the only state in the nation to send a smaller percentage of students directly to a four-year college than California, the study said.
The spring mailing of college acceptances "is a time of great celebration and that makes all the sense in the world," said John Rogers, associate director of the UCLA Institute for Democracy, Education and Access. "But I think its also the time to remember all of the classmates with those students who are . . . not ready for college."
Schools across the East Bay generally send more students to four-year colleges than many other districts in the state, according to the report, which also provides a useful breakdown of how many college preparatory classes are offered.
The fewer classes offered, the less chances a student will have to take those college prep courses needed to qualify for a four-year college, Rogers said. Schools are deficient if less than 67 percent of the classes offered are college prep, he said. California's average is 65 percent.
But 80 percent of the classes offered at College Park, Mt. Diablo's biggest high school, would be considered college preparatory. Ygnacio Valley High -- the district's smallest high school with about 1,500 students -- has 76 percent of its classes geared toward college.
Welsh, who has been watching students at College Park for three years and has a son in college, said"the most important thing they need are rigorous academic classes." She also said more money is needed for teachers and counselors to prepare students for a higher degree.
At Richmond High's career center in West Contra Costa, college counselor Sharon Arvie echoes the desire for more staff. In addition to Arvie, who focuses just on college counseling, Richmond has three counselors to coach students on what classes to take as they work through high school. There are nearly 1,800 students enrolled at the school, according to the study.
Arvie is busy this month posting college acceptance letters to a board outside her room. So far, she has nearly 50 letters displayed.
"It's motivation for the students and the faculty," Arvie said.
California has fewer counselors per student than schools in all other states, with the average high school counselor here expected to serve 790 students, according to the study.
At the same time, the study ranked California 43rd among states in education spending per student after adjusting for regional costs differences. Ninety-four percent of the state's students attend schools in districts that spend less than the national average.
Rogers said the study is being released in an effort to influence state lawmakers to improve funding and data collection for education. Among the initiatives in Sacramento are proposals to improve access to college prep classes and to increase money for teacher recruiting in low-performing schools.
But on the ground at College Park the staff doesn't wait for money.
"We have about 600 freshman and it took me the entire month of January to talk to them all," Welsh said. So what?
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