Tracey Taylor

New York Times, March 19, 2010

Photo by Heidi Schumann/New York Times.

As college admissions season draws to a close, the spotlight has been on students’ getting a foot in the door. Less attention is paid to how many of today’s high school seniors will emerge a few years down the line with diplomas in hand, and what might cause them to veer off track.

It is much tougher to stay the course in college if you are the first in your family to enroll in college, if you have rarely strayed far from home and if your life is still affected by family problems, be it a jobless parent or an addicted sibling.

At a national level, one student in two enrolling in college earns a degree within six years. In the Bay Area’s most challenged communities, the ratio is far worse.

The problem is most acute among young black and Latino men. According to data gathered by the Oakland Unified School District, only 8 percent of black teenagers entering ninth grade will get a bachelor’s degree. Only 34 percent of black male students, and 44 percent of Latino male students who entered the combined University of California and California State University system in 2001 had graduated six years later. The rate for white men was 62 percent.

That statistic, graduation rates, is in the cross hairs of the East Bay College Fund. It is perhaps the most visible of a small but growing number of Bay Area nonprofits that are beginning to make inroads in steering young, at-risk students to college, and also helping them through it. The fund’s method is to supplement financial aid with a carefully administered program of mentoring, peer-to-peer guidance and life-skills training.

Experts in education say the program may provide a model for bridging the college completion gap.

Take the case of Jameil Butler. His college aspirations were almost destroyed, despite his talent as a football player, when, in 2003, he took a bullet in the stomach outside a Sacramento nightclub. Then 17 and a football star at Oakland Tech, Mr. Butler had been assured by his coach that he was in line to receive an athletic scholarship. The injury eliminated that possibility.

After seeing a presentation by the East Bay College Fund at his high school, Mr. Butler put his future in the hands of the organizations that provide financial aid to underprivileged students.

Mr. Butler is now about to graduate from Fresno State, and he said he owed his success to being selected by a nonprofit that not only makes money available, but is also committed to assisting its scholars through graduation.

When Mr. Butler’s grades slipped 18 months ago, his East Bay fund mentor was there to help. “I didn’t hold up my side of the bargain for a while,” Mr. Butler said, “but they continued to be in my corner.”

The majority of educational charities have traditionally concentrated on the front end of the process. Government policy has also tended to concentrate on access, and has only recently turned its attention to completion, said David L. Kirp, a professor at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley.

“We need more strategies to keep kids in school,” Dr. Kirp said. “The financial crunch has led to higher tuition fees, and cuts in courses, which means some students are facing a more expensive, longer term at college.”

Seeing the horizon stretching out indefinitely can discourage students who are already feeling overwhelmed.

The East Bay fund’s program, which awards individual grants of $16,000 spread across four years, is founded on graduation targets: it aims to have 75 percent of its scholars graduate within six years. Since its start seven years ago, the fund is on track to meet that goal. Twenty-nine of its sponsored students are on track to earn diplomas by the end of this academic year.

Having a mentor’s support through college was crucial for Brittany Chambers. Now a senior anthropology major at Berkeley, Ms. Chambers became a mother while attending Excel College Preparatory High School in Oakland. Despite the obstacles, she decided to try for college. Now she hopes to earn a masters’ degree in public health.

Her mentor, Patty Gates, a lawyer who volunteers for the East Bay fund, helps her prepare for exams, takes her to lunch once a month and is on call to talk. “I call her with personal problems, Ms. Chambers said. “She’s always there.” When the father of Ms. Chamber’s now 5-year-old daughter was murdered, the fund provided support.

Andy Fremder, a co-founder of the fund, said the organization concentrated on Oakland, where 70 percent of high school students are black or Hispanic, groups that are underrepresented on college campuses.

“Oakland can seem like a third-world country to some people,” Mr. Fremder said. “Many of these high school kids live under so much duress that a college education seems like a fantasy.”

Mr. Fremder and his team visit most Oakland high schools each year to talk to seniors about the fund.

In mid-January Mr. Fremder was at Life Academy High School of Health and Bioscience, where about 15 students turned up at a threadbare auditorium to hear him speak. Mr. Fremder opened with a question: “How many of you are interested in getting a $16,000 college fund?” Having secured their attention, he explained that beneficiaries must have a B to B+ average and documented financial need.

They must also be able to demonstrate that they have overcome obstacles and are capable of seeking help. “We want to know your story; we want to know you,” Mr. Fremder said.

Helping Mr. Fremder with the presentation was Sam Becerra, 24, a Latino who grew up in East Oakland. An East Bay fund scholar who graduated from Pomona College in 2008, Mr. Becerra now works in the financial services industry in San Francisco.

Dressed smartly, Mr. Beccera took each question in stride, admitting he had been so nervous on his first day at Pomona that he threw up, but went on to have four enjoyable years.

The East Bay fund is modeled on the Meritus College Fund, a San Francisco group that has awarded 300 scholarships since it was set up in 1996. Its founder, Dr. Henry Safrit, said that when the fund noticed a drop in the number of black men applying for grants it decided to take action.

“These are the kids at highest risk,” Dr. Safrit said. “They drop out of school, never work, are killed. It’s a waste of humanity.”

The fund revised its application requirements to include C grades in certain circumstances, and started a pilot program at two San Francisco high schools, where it monitors and supports every black male student. Erik Moore, a bond trader with Banc of America Securities in San Francisco, volunteers for the East Bay fund. Many of the young men , Mr. Moore said, need affection. “These are macho guys,” he said. “Sometimes you just want to hug them.”

Mr. Moore also makes a point of showing his charges what is possible. He takes them to where he works so they can experience the excitement of the trading floor. He also takes them to fund-raisers in stately homes on the Peninsula.

Mr. Moore, who is black, is in a good position to demonstrate to young black men what can be achieved. He grew up in Richmond and said it was through the encouragement of a next-door neighbor who became his mentor that he went on to graduate from Dartmouth College and get an M.B.A. at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.

“A lot of the kids want to be Michael Jordan,” Mr. Moore said. “I show them that suits can make more money than athletes.”

The college completion model is getting noticed. In 2008, after many years of channeling its energies toward a diverse number of causes, the Berkeley Community Fund opted to pattern itself on the East Bay fund program and offer four-year scholarships and mentoring to students at Berkeley High School. Donors can choose to support an individual student.

“After we retooled,” said Jessica Pers, board president of the community fund, “we doubled our donations in 2009 over 2008.”

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Tuesday December 23, 2003

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Scotland’s ancient language is making a comeback,
explains Tracey Taylor

As children, Mary Galbraith’s grandparents were belted if they were overheard speaking Gaelic in the playground, even though it was the language they spoke at home. Even as adults they never properly mastered English. Just two generations later, Galbraith’s commitment to her grandparents’ native tongue is such that although she doesn’t speak it herself she sends her two daughters, Seona and Moire, to a school where the entire curriculum is taught in Gaelic.

Glasgow Gaelic school (Bunsgoil Gáidhlig Ghlaschu) is Scotland’s only dedicated Gaelic-speaking school. Children have all their lessons in the language and only start some lessons in English after they have been there three years. However, across Scotland more than 5,000 children learn Gaelic, many of them from homes where neither parent speaks the language.

What motivates parents to have their children learn a minority language? Gaelic is in decline - 99% of Scots don’t understand a word of it and, if the number of speakers falls below 50,000 (it now stands at around 60,000), Gaelic will be officially dead. Nevertheless, the Scottish Executive invests more than £3m a year in Gaelic education. A Gaelic language bill, currently in draft stage, is due to be introduced to parliament next summer with the aim of securing the status of Gaelic in Scotland.

For Mary Galbraith the answer is straightforward: “I wanted to give my children an opportunity that wasn’t there for me. I never learned Gaelic. The girls were looked after by a Gaelic-speaking childminder so they were already bilingual. It made sense that they continued with a Gaelic-medium education.”

Reconnecting with one’s roots and cultural heritage is clearly a significant factor. Gaelic was the main language in most rural areas of Scotland until the early 17th century, but it was outlawed by the crown in 1616, and suppressed further after the Jacobite rebellion of 1745. “For hundreds of years, and until fairly recently, Gaelic was seen as a second-class language,” says Margaret Maciver, educational officer at Comunn Na Gáidhlig, a body set up to promote Gaelic.

Bringing up children to be bilingual has been shown to offer other, more general advantages including enhanced creative thinking, improved test results, higher self-esteem and greater tolerance. For this reason it is not only those with Gaelic ancestry who are rediscovering Scotland’s mother tongue. “We see families who have moved from England who are having their children taught Gaelic as it is the ‘local’ language,” says Donald John McCloud, Gaelic education advisor for the Highland council which, along with the Western Islands, embraces the Gaelic heartland.

These facts are not lost on Caroline Stewart, mother to seven-year-old Alexander, who also attends Glasgow Gaelic school. “My older daughter spent a year at school in France and has spoken French since. Children who speak more than one language have been shown to have better cognitive skills. I wanted Alexander to be bilingual so I was looking for a school that taught a second language. The fact he was learning Gaelic rather than another language was secondary at first. But now I am pleased: the more I learn about the history of the language the more important I feel it is to preserve it.”

Gaelic now features at all levels of Scottish education: pre-school, primary, secondary, further and higher education, and as part of teacher training. In 2002-2003 there were 1,928 primary-level and 375 secondary-level children in Gaelic-medium education. Another 3,000, approximately, learn Gaelic as a second language, usually in special Gaelic-language units within schools. The number of Gaelic-speaking teachers graduating in 2003 was 25 (for primary school teaching), an increase of eight on the number qualifying in 2002.

These are not big numbers and, despite the avowed support of Peter Peacock, Scotland’s minister for education and young people, who has said his aim is to ensure Gaelic “survives and thrives”, the Gaelic lobby faces a struggle. Obstacles include a lack of Gaelic-speaking teachers, a paucity of teaching materials and a drop-off in the provision of Gaelic education at secondary level. Detractors also point to the limited usefulness of Gaelic compared to, say, a modern European language in the increasingly globalised career market.

Boyd Robertson, senior lecturer in Gaelic at the University of Strathclyde, which trains Gaelic teachers, says the teacher-shortage problem needs to be solved urgently, particularly within secondary schools. “At the primary level there is something of an equilibrium between supply and demand, but the numbers of secondary school teachers are not growing in the way that is required.”

Supporters of Gaelic tend to look for inspiration to Wales, where concerted efforts since the 1930s have resulted in census figures that show that 26% of people under the age of 35 can now speak Welsh, which has been included in the national curriculum since 1988. One in five primary pupils are taught in classes where Welsh is used either as the main medium or for teaching part of the curriculum; one in seven secondary school children are taught Welsh as a first language, and four in five learn it as a second language.

One technique used to accelerate the take-up of Welsh has been “immersion education”, a concept that is now being put into practice in Scotland. The idea is for children as young as nursery school age to “plunge” into a language completely speaking, reading and writing it all day.

In order for Gaelic to have a good chance of reproducing itself, at least a third of under-25-year-olds need to speak the language. Scotland is a long way off achieving this. The Scottish Executive, which earlier this year set up Bórd na Gáidhlig, a development body to promote Gaelic, has given itself a target of a 5% annual increase in the number of Gaelic medium-educated primary school children. Privately, however, civil servants admit they would like to see a much higher take-up. “To be truthful, we are very jealous of Wales,” says one.

The pupils at Glasgow Gaelic school can take credit for a small victory in the crusade. Fed-up that they couldn’t read about their favourite fictional character in Gaelic, this summer they sent dozens of letters to Bloomsbury, publishers of Harry Potter. As a result, a Gaelic edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone looks set to appear next year.