EPAS^® Meets Unique Needs of GEAR UP Programs

“GEAR UP hopes to provide systemic change in helping students on the path to college, which means that you’ve got to take information about students’ academic progress and plans and have everybody working together—parents, schools, colleges, the community,” said Ellmore. “The idea is to get all students ready for college so they can make that choice when the time comes. And that is what EPAS does. It helps educators make sure students’ plans and dreams and aspirations match up, that students understand what it takes to go to college and are being realistic.”

Because GEAR UP recognizes that “ready for college” entails more than academics, many programs include counseling, mentorship programs, financial aid information, campus visits, parent information programs, and community involvement. The multifaceted approach to readiness for college was found to be typical of the most successful early intervention programs in a study by the Institute for Higher Education Policy released in March.

GEAR UP has awarded 324 five-year grants serving more than 1.2 million students.

The program makes two types of awards, state grants and partnership grants. State grants go to agencies designated by the governor of the state to administer the program. Partnership grants go to alliances of at least one college or university, at least one low-income middle school, and at least two other partners such as community organizations and businesses. Most states with GEAR UP programs have both types of grants; although independent of each other, they work to coordinate their efforts.

GEAR UP emphasizes an early start and sustained intervention. Programs identify students no later than the seventh grade. GEAR UP grants originally covered five years. This year they were extended to a sixth year to allow programs to follow students throughout middle and high school.

“We know that going to college is a process, not an event,” said Ellmore. “In the eighties and early nineties, educators were talking about reaching out to tenth graders. Now we know if we don’t make some interventions for these students by the time they are transitioning into high school, they will already be way behind their peers. The GEAR UP program is reaching down to students in middle school and providing information to build a foundation for their later academic and postsecondary success.”

EPAS does the same thing. It includes three assessments, EXPLORE^® for eighth and ninth graders, PLAN^® for tenth graders, and the ACT Assessment^® for eleventh and twelve graders. Each assesses academic skills and collects career planning information. Test content and score scales are linked, allowing students and teachers to track progress and make score-range predictions from one test to another.

Used with ACT’s Standards for Transition^® and Pathways for Transition^®, the tests can tell students, teachers, and parents exactly what it will take to move the student to the next level of proficiency. The Standards detail skills typically mastered by students who score in certain ranges on each test. Pathways provide teachers with strategies for moving a student from one level to the next. In this way, EPAS provides a common language to help secondary and postsecondary educators prepare students for college and career success. EPAS provides opportunities for educators, students, and parents to work together toward a common goal—being ready for any opportunity.

Adding DISCOVER^®, ACT’s premier interest inventory and career planning program, can further aid GEAR UP programs with additional college and career planning information.

“ACT’s mission—providing information for life’s transitions—just dovetails so perfectly with GEAR UP,” said Ellmore.

Washington State: Focusing on Individual Students

Washington state features noteworthy examples of statewide and partnership grants.

The statewide project, initiated by a $2.7 million award in 1999 and administered by the Higher Education Coordinating Board, focuses on 1,200 middle and high school students in twelve communities.

“Most GEAR UP programs work from a whole cohort approach, where they identify an entire seventh-grade class, for example. The focus then is on working a lot in the school day. Washington chose to do a more intensive model with students in a few select communities. We can work very intensively with a smaller number of students,” said John McLain, associate director for GEAR UP. His program is administered outside of school hours, through a number of after-school and community-based programs. Students are required to spend 150 hours a year in program activities, their parents are required to spend 40 hours per year.

“Our program emphasis has been two-pronged. One is promoting rigorous academic achievement. The other is the outreach and planning that goes into being ready.”

The EPAS assessments measure the academics of Washington’s program.

“Probably the most important thing we have done is to bring the EPAS system to the program,” McLain said. “First, it is curriculum based and that tells students exactly what they need to know to get into college. Second, it gives us an additional assessment beyond grades and homework, an across-the-board way of examining how our students are doing, which is important because we can implement it with a variety of partners that have very different backgrounds. Third, it helps us a great deal with the transition from middle school to high school. We’re able to let students see themselves academically in the eighth grade when they still have plenty of time to choose the kind of rigorous coursework they will need. And, finally, it is a program that reaches across grades and follows students in meaningful ways throughout their middle and high school careers.”

The students are not required to take the EPAS assessments, but about 75 percent of them do.

“We really try to convince students of the value of taking the tests by showing them what they can do with the results,” McLain said. Test days often also include breakfasts, lunches, field trips, or other special events. Starting this year, the students are being trained to interpret test results for their parents.

“The notion is that if students understand the results of their academic assessment, they will own their academic plans, and if they do that, they will have taken responsibility for their own futures.”

Washington also has been awarded ten partnership grants. The Mid Columbia Basin College GEAR UP project, awarded $3.2 million starting in 1999, uses a variety of strategies to help students in seventh through twelfth grade in the Pasco School District plan and prepare for college. Every student creates a portfolio that includes interests, abilities, goals, aspirations, and accomplishments. Students can participate in after-school tutoring, conferences, and visits to college campuses and local work sites. Their parents are trained to advocate for them.

In 2002, the project won one of 10 Golden Apple Awards, which recognize stellar programs and individuals in education in Washington.

The Mid Columbia Basin College GEAR UP project has administered EXPLORE to about 650 middle schoolers annually for three years. This school year, it added PLAN.

“ACT has been a significant and valuable component of the project from the start,” said Debbie Dougan, who directs the project. “We administer the EXPLORE assessment in eighth grade. Every one of our eighth-grade students takes the test and receives the results. The test is integrated into the curriculum and takes place during the regular school day.

“This year we started administering PLAN in the tenth grade in the same way. I think that this allows students to see that preparing for college is a process that must begin early and continue through middle school and high school. For us, it is really important that the information be tied to the world of work. Of course, EPAS reports are and this is very clear to the students when they receive the results. They learn not only about their academic strengths and weaknesses, but also about how they are related to specific occupational areas. This connection to the world of work is probably the most unique aspect of our program. Prior to GEAR UP, there already was a very successful school-to-work model in the high school. GEAR UP provided an opportunity to expand that to include middle school and also put more emphasis on preparing for higher education. Most jobs today require some form of higher education to prepare workers. Therefore, this connection makes perfect sense. In essence, our GEAR UP program is a middle school-to-high school-to-college-to-work model.”

Louisiana: Academic Preparation Comes First

Louisiana is taking a different tack with its new $12.5 million GEAR UP grant, awarded in 2002.

“One of the major emphases of LA GEAR UP is academics,” said Stephanie Williamson, assistant director for LA GEAR UP. “To fully address the goals of the program, there are several core initiatives that we consider essential, such as content-focused professional development for teachers, tutoring programs for students, and academic and financial planning programs for parents and students. To engage LA GEAR UP schools in the full-range of initiatives, we are developing a cooperative agreement and contract with each school which specifically outlines the responsibilities of both LA GEAR UP and affected schools and districts.”

The state faces big challenges. Its needs are “severe and pervasive,” as its GEAR UP grant application puts it. Conditions for children in Louisiana are the worst in the nation, according to the study, 2000 Kids Count Data, which ranked states on the basis of various educational, economic, social, and environmental factors. Louisiana’s own data confirm the grim picture: only 16.1 percent of Louisiana adults have earned bachelor’s degrees—compared to a national average of 24.7 percent—and 59 percent of all students qualify for the free or reduced lunch program.

“We hope to convey to LA GEAR UP students a realistic hope that they can be successful in college,” Williamson said. “We are doing everything we can think of to make LA GEAR UP a long term, comprehensive program to help these kids think, ‘I can handle this and I’m prepared for it.’”

Among the elements of Louisiana’s program are student and parent support and counseling programs, technology training for teachers, standards-based tutoring, summer learning camps, technology-rich after-school and Saturday programs, college awareness programs, public awareness and community support programs, financial aid and scholarships, and family Internet access. Academic preparation is emphasized over counseling.

“We feel that academic preparation is the single most important component of LA GEAR UP. If we are not successful in this area, students are not likely to succeed. This is not to say that the rest of the initiatives are not important, but academic preparation is our No. 1 priority,” Williamson said. And that is where EPAS comes in. “EPAS indicates students’ primary weaknesses in each subject area. LA GEAR UP works with universities to develop professional development programs that are designed to help teachers deal effectively with these weaknesses.

EXPLORE is administered statewide to help students, teachers, and counselors prepare effectively for Louisiana’s Educational Assessment Program (LEAP) test—part of its accountability system. “We give this EPAS test in the fall so that teachers will be alerted to the areas in which students will need special attention to do well on the LEAP,” Williamson said.

Louisiana also plans to use EPAS results to focus teacher training efforts and, perhaps, to guide the development of after-school and Saturday programs, said Dr. Kerry Davidson, deputy commissioner for sponsored programs. “The GEAR UP program has a variety of extra-school activities associated with it. My thinking is that a lot of those are not of the academic quality that we want. While we are making this major effort in professional development using the insights we get from EPAS, it is a good time for us to reflect on how they can be used in these other programs.”

Mississippi: Sowing the Seeds of a Grass-Roots Effort

Mississippi, which also was awarded a $12.5 million grant for a statewide GEAR UP program in 2002, is being careful to spend time soliciting information from its schools and communities before implementing programs.

“We need to determine where they think their challenges are,” said Dr. William McHenry, assistant commissioner of academic affairs for public universities in Mississippi. “We want to make sure there is buy-in, and that is a slow process.”

The state started with joint meetings with all 37 school districts in the program, then moved to individual meetings with each. Town meetings were held with parents and community members, too. “That’s the only way to get the job done,” said McHenry.

Educators there used ACT programs to gather baseline data and to bring students on board with the GEAR UP program.

“Initially, of course, we’re doing background work, so we partnered with ACT to use the EXPLORE assessment to see where students are in our state,” McHenry said. All 37 participating school districts administered EXPLORE, to a total of 7,424 students. The initial data will be compared to data from subsequent EPAS assessments during the course of the grant. “We will administer PLAN when they reach that age, and the ACT Assessment when they reach that age.”

“We’re also working with ACT’s DISCOVER program to ensure there is some student buy-in with GEAR UP,” McHenry added.

“We want to make certain that the discussion we’re having today is not the discussion that is happening five years from now.”

Oklahoma: Running Full Throttle from the Start

Oklahoma’s GEAR UP program has been in high gear from the start. It was one of the few states to award GEAR UP scholarships in the first year of the program. It received a $20.5 million state grant and 10 partnership grants in 1999. Four more partnership grants have since been awarded. The implementing organizations coordinate and support efforts in their common goal of preparing all students for college. They use a three-pronged approach of scholarship funding, college readiness, and statewide awareness.

The state grant’s college readiness portion is built upon Oklahoma’s earlier success with EPAS, which has been voluntarily adopted by nearly all the districts in the state. Each year, 30 school districts are designated as GEAR UP focus districts, qualifying them for $18,000 in direct financial support from the state as well as free support services from GEAR UP partners—organizations that donate funds and services to the initiative. To be eligible for the designation, the district must use EPAS.

“GEAR UP helps districts create stronger, more rigorous and diverse educational opportunities for their students,” said State Regents Chairman Carl R. Renfro. “Its impact on Oklahoma’s classrooms is positive and comes at a time when all public education entities are stretching every resource to the fullest.”

Focus districts conduct needs assessments to identify gaps and weaknesses in district services designed to prepare seventh through twelfth-grade students for college—academically and financially. GEAR UP services are designed to fill those gaps.

“Through Oklahoma GEAR UP, we are able to offer students across the state specific programs that are tailored to meet their specific needs,” Dolores Mize, assistant vice chancellor, said. “For example, school districts have used GEAR UP funding to provide mentoring and tutoring activities, accelerated reading programs, ACT prep courses and software, career exploration tools, and advanced placement training. In addition, GEAR UP provides staff development opportunities for teachers, counselors and administrators in a variety of areas.”

From a broader perspective, Oklahoma GEAR UP also is using EPAS to build teacher effectiveness.

“We are using EPAS to help with data-driven decision making in the classroom,” Mize said. “Many teachers don’t have the skills needed to effectively use the data to change instruction. GEAR UP, combined with grant funds through Title II of the No Child Left Behind Act, provides professional development for teachers using test data to understand how to revamp school curricula and instructional strategies, especially in mathematics, where Oklahoma students need the most help.”

Oklahoma’s efforts now are bearing fruit. The 2002 report card for Oklahoma higher education, released by the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education in December, shows Oklahoma students holding steady in their ACT Assessment scores at 20.5, even as the national average composite score dropped from 20.9 to 20.8.

Also, enrollment is booming in Oklahoma’s college tuition scholarship program, which pays tuition to any public two-year or four-year university in the state for students who complete program requirements. Before 1999, an average of 1,350 students enrolled in the program annually. That number increased by 9,735 students in 2000–2001—nearly as many students enrolled in the program that year as in the first eight years combined. Officials credit the outreach efforts offered through GEAR UP and EPAS.

“Academic preparation in the middle schools and high schools has benefited from these foundational state level programs, which have gained new energy from GEAR UP. We expect to see even further improvements in the years ahead,” Mize said.

Keeping GEAR UP from Gearing Down

Despite the size of GEAR UP, the 1.2 million students it now serves, and the obvious support for it among educators, its future is not yet clear.

Created by Congress and championed by the Clinton administration, the GEAR UP program has not received increasing fiscal support from the Bush administration. The Bush budget for fiscal year 2003 proposed $285 million for GEAR UP; Congress tacked on another $10 million before approving it in February. The president signed the bill, but his proposed budget for fiscal year 2004 returns GEAR UP funding to $285 million, equal to what it received in 2002. According to the U.S. Department of Education, that money would be used to extend 1999 GEAR UP grants for a sixth year. The DOE is not soliciting proposals for new GEAR UP grants. In future years, the administration will look at the results of the program when considering funding requests, according to the DOE.

In the states, programs funded with GEAR UP grants move forward hopefully.

“We want to keep making positive changes in Oklahoma’s high schools with GEAR UP through the next reauthorization of the Higher Education Act,” said Oklahoma’s Mize. “We believe that GEAR UP provides a great systemic reform strategy for strengthening high schools so that students who reap the benefits of No Child Left Behind will transition into high schools that are ready for them. EPAS has been our means, in Oklahoma, of readying middle and high schools for those students.

“Additionally, we are pleased with the support of the Bush administration for funding the sixth year, and equally pleased with the unanimous support from Oklahoma’s members of Congress toward making GEAR UP a long-lasting reform program for our state,” Mize added.

Washington state’s McLain is encouraged by the fact that legislators added funds to the proposed budget for the program in the 2003 budget. He thinks GEAR UP complements the goals of the administration’s No Child Left Behind Act well.

“This is an important, substantive program that has backing from education advocacy groups and lawmakers across the spectrum. It can provide the kind of programmatic support that schools need to make NCLB a reality,” he said. “Anytime you can get Democrats and Republicans together on a program the way that GEAR UP has been able to do it, you know it’s a keeper.”

For more information on EPAS, call 319/337-1040, e-mail epas@act.org

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