Staying On-Track in Grade 9

The journey toward graduation begins in Grade 9, and with this foundation, we support all students in continuing their forward momentum to stay on-track in Grades 10 through 12. One tried-and-true strategy for doing so is through quarterly on-track student conferences.

During these conferences, students meet with a caring adult — which may be a teacher, administrator, or another staff member — to discuss their goals, strengths, and growth areas. Conversations are guided by questions and a summary of student data, including behavior, attendance, and grades, in each student’s RISE on-track report.

Though concrete figures like grades and number of absences are reviewed during conferences, they also serve as an opportunity for adults to check in on students’ social and emotional well-being. “On-track conferences allow us to do a light touch wellness check on the students,” says Jamie Meurer, RISE Senior On-Track Coach for Hartford Public H.S. “Information gathered from certain students may lead to follow-up with their educators on a deeper level.”

Conferences serve as a checkpoint during each marking period, giving students a voice and helping them generate a plan of action. Following conferences, Grade 9 teams allocate time to review student responses to identify themes and make plans for the marking period ahead.

On-track conferences began as a Grade 9 strategy, but the momentum quickly brought this structure to Grades 10 through 12 and to additional schools such as Weaver H.S., Bulkeley H.S., and Kinsella Magnet School in Hartford. Weaver's Grade 9 team has incorporated conference questions soliciting student feedback, then developed a protocol to review student responses, identify themes, and consider implications based on these insights, such as finding more ways to recognize and celebrate students in the classroom.

Change Ideas in Action: Extended Day Programming

At RISE, we embrace change ideas as a way to push for continuous improvement. Rather than simply replicating strategies year-over-year, we also study the data to identify improvement opportunities. RISE has developed our change protocol into four steps: Review, Identify, Spark, and Expand.

Extended Day Programming (EDP) offers additional support to students outside of regular class times, whether that be during lunch, study halls, after school, or on Saturdays. EDP has emerged as a high-impact program on a national level as it reaches many students and has been shown to positively improve student success outcomes and academic performance in meaningful ways. (1),(2)

Given its importance and promise, RISE’s Freshman Success Team (FST) implemented network-wide EDP this past year as their key change idea, with the primary goals of capacity building and student engagement. To achieve these, our FST sought to establish extended day programs that meet at least once quarterly in each of our core network schools, with 50% or more of the invited students participating consistently.

One particular success story is at Manchester H.S. (MHS), where the entire freshman class was invited to participate in EDP and nearly 50% attended one or more sessions. Language Arts teacher Kaitlyn Kennedy, who coordinates EDP at MHS, says that she and her team “are thoughtful about pausing after a session and reflecting on what went well and what we would do differently. This shows in our results, as we not only have a wide variety of kids participating, but also, many are coming back.”

(1) The Value of Out of School Time Programs, the Rand Corporation.

(2) Closing the Gap through Extended Learning Opportunities, National Education Association.