[Editor’s note: we asked Hartford Promise Executive Director Richard Sugarman for a description of the first complement of Hartford Promise scholars.  Here is his update.]

The first group of Hartford Promise Scholars is 144 strong – amazing students who truly reflect the rich diversity of our city. These Promise Scholars represent multiple races, nationalities, religions and cultures.  They have attended all of our neighborhood, magnet and charter high schools. In many cases, they have overcome obstacles and hardships and have demonstrated true academic dedication and perseverance.

What does it take to be a Promise Scholar?

1.  Attend a Hartford Public High School continuously since Ninth Grade

2.  Be a Hartford Resident throughout high school

3.  Have a 93 percent or better cumulative attendance record during high school

4.  Have a 3.0 cumulative GPA or better on a 4.0 scale in high school

And what do Promise Scholars receive?

Up to a $20,000 scholarship for four-year colleges

Up to a $5,000 scholarship for two-year colleges

The launch of Hartford Promise has been very successful. Hartford Promise has been on the ground in Hartford high schools, raising visibility and awareness of our program.

Already the Promise Scholarship has had an impact on college decision making. Many more students are now able to attend four-year colleges, or to choose more highly ranked colleges. In addition, many can now choose to live on campus. These choices are ones which studies show lead to higher college graduation rates.

Our Promise Scholars are attending a wide variety of remarkable institutions: Yale, Wesleyan, UConn, Franklin & Marshall, Lafayette, Goodwin, Mount Holyoke, University of Saint Joseph, Trinity, Capital Community College, Springfield College, Eastern Connecticut State, Tufts, University of Hartford, Central Connecticut State, Manchester Community College, Wellesley, and others.

One of our proudest accomplishments during this first year was being able to leverage Promise Scholarship funds into additional college financial support. For example, UConn, Eastern Connecticut, and the University of Chicago will each match our Promise Scholarship, providing up to $5,000 a year in additional financial support for Promise Scholars. In addition, the University of Saint Joseph is providing free housing for Promise Scholars, and Central Connecticut State is providing an additional $3,000 housing grant to Promise Scholars this year.

Learn from Failures, Vault to Success

On August 10th we all gathered for our inaugural Hartford Promise Scholar Day – a day of celebration that afforded the students an opportunity to forge lasting bonds with each other as well as with our Hartford Promise staff. We know that creating a sense of belonging, as well as having peer and advocacy support, are all keys to successful college outcomes. In addition to creating meaningful connections, we felt it was essential that our scholars left the day with a better understanding of college expectations and the importance of self-advocacy. We stressed that a successful college experience comes from learning through both academic successes and failures, and that the perseverance that brought them this far will no doubt serve them well in their future.

Maybe the best way to truly understand the impact of the Promise Scholarships is to hear from the Promise Scholars in their own words:

~ “The Promise Scholarship is special to me because it is specific to Hartford. Living in Hartford it sometimes seems that very little is available to us, so to have this scholarship awarded to me and others in the city makes me feel special and hopeful. I am honored and excited for this opportunity to attend Wesleyan.”  Jada Jenkins, Achievement First HS

~ “This scholarship has been a pivotal part of my college decision making. Prior to this, tuition had been the most important factor in my decision. The Promise has enabled me to attend the college of my choice, UCONN. I plan to pursue a medical career in hopes of becoming a pediatrician, and I am honored to say that Hartford Promise has brought me closer to my dream.”  Franches Garay, Hartford Trinity Magnet HS

~ “The day that Richard Sugarman came to my school and introduced the Promise Scholarship altered my college decisions completely. It gave me the opportunity to go to an out-of-state school, Caldwell University. My parents were delighted to find that their daughter, the first family member to attend college, would be able to chase her dreams. Thanks to Hartford Promise every goal and ambition I ever had is becoming a reality.”   Elizabeth Rebeiro, Hartford Trinity Magnet HS

The ripple effect a Promise Scholarship can have is remarkable: it starts with our Promise Scholars, moves outward to include their families, and ultimately can encompass and transform the City of Hartford as we strengthen its college-going culture, increase student expectations and the number of Hartford students graduating from college, and add to a larger, more qualified, local workforce.  Our Promise Scholars are true role models, and they are a source of hope and optimism for the future of our city.

The Bottom Line.   Adding new voices to the content of our Education Matters! publication is important, and so is the work of the Hartford Promise in removing barriers to higher education for our talented young people, who are the future of Hartford and the State.  Families need to break the cycle of poverty, students need to reach their potential, Hartford needs well-educated and well-employed residents, and our employers need a talent-filled pipeline.  Aligning interests and working backwards from one goal of post-secondary degree completion is the goal of the All In! Coalition, set to launch publicly in late September; a critically important effort. Hartford’s time is right now.

In an interview last week, Superintendent Beth Schiavino Narvaez discussed how the District will realize its vaunted “Acceleration Agenda” even as State and City budget cuts are costing layoffs at every level.  What’s the plan to keep up the pace?

“Investing in people is key to the District’s continuing progress toward the Acceleration Agenda,” Dr. Narvaez told us.  That investment, she hastened to add, has a lot to do with the culture of public service, as every staff member from top to bottom will be asked to do more.

The issue of investing in people is important, as professional development will tell the tale for how complex issues of educating Hartford children are handled throughout the District schools and its central office.  Or, as Dr. Narvaez believes, “School improvement is people improvement; concentration on developing leaders of learning is the crux of the Acceleration Agenda.”

Six K-8 Hartford elementary schools formed the first complement of Acceleration Agenda efforts: Milner, Burns Latino Studies Academy, Burr, Wish, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Clark. This coming year, Simpson-Waverly, SAND plus Asian Studies will be joining.

At those schools – and in additional schools to be added once the results are analyzed – implementing the Acceleration Agenda will be based on supports that include additional time for collaborative practice; dedicated and individualized student/family support services; hands-on coaching aligned to standards, curriculum, pedagogy and best assessment practices; technical assistance and network support; and tailored professional learning opportunities within and outside the district.

A Good Start to Build On

The District has eight “equity indicators,” and has reached its 2016 targets in six, as illustrated in this chart.  For the two indicators that fell short of the targets (Third Grade reading proficiency and passing Algebra by the end of Ninth Grade), positive gains nonetheless were lodged.  As back-to-school public information, the District will produce an annual report to detail the gains – and how the gaps will be confronted, the superintendent said.  So will we, once state data are released on Year 2 administration of the SBAC tests.

Looking at the school situation more broadly, Dr. Narvaez spoke to how partnerships with higher education, community agencies, the business community (and many others) are so instrumental in making school improvement possible.  Here, she has found, a unique aspect of Hartford is that stakeholders across the board are positive, preferring solutions to whining about problems.  Mostly.

In setting up the District’s Equity 2020 Advisory Committee to weigh the matter of school consolidation in light of shrinking student enrollment, Dr. Narvaez has a clear-eyed view.  After past short-term and non-sustainable, not to say hasty, planning brought an ever-changing kaleidoscope of schools, it is high time for a master plan.  Framing it for the longer term will be about managing resources in ways that deliver a 21^st century education for Hartford children.

We asked Dr. Narvaez this question: How will the major steps now being taken (judicious, but sharp central office compression, a new Chief Operating Officer who knows the city and the schools, continued City Connect and ANet contracts, adaptations to a smaller staff, etc.) be implemented to help the Acceleration Agenda to work … in spite of the severe State, City, and Board budget crises?

Here’s what she elaborated:

“We now must sharpen our priorities and focus in the coming year to building on the progress we have made. In addition, we are working to deepen our partnerships – City Connects is a big help in doing this and in getting to every student in the school – to provide resources for our schools in order to be able to provide the enrichment and support our students deserve.

“Last, we are attending to our infrastructure, creating a long term plan for facilities and programs that will help us to concentrate resources to serve our students, rather than making our resources so diffuse by spreading them out over a number of under-enrolled schools.”

The Bottom Line.  The pain of tight budgets is felt nowhere more acutely than at the school level, where there will be fewer programs and services for students – and fewer caring adults.  The focus on human capital is right on, but it begs the question: How will Hartford get the most out of every teacher and staff member in every school?  Closer analyses of teacher training as it relates to youth development, quality measures, and peer-to-peer support will constitute our follow-up.

Hartford City Councilwoman Cynthia Jennings has a two-pronged view of the Council’s role as regards education: First, it has a duty to raise and resolve issues; second, it must vigorously represent the constituencies electing them to serve.  “But you need to know the system well enough to serve the people,” she emphasized.

In a recent interview – and in responses she wrote us to elaborate on her views with respect to the role and priorities of the Council in education, the Councilwoman made it plain that empowering citizens is not just a personal passion, but one that must be backed by action.

[Editor’s note: This article is the fourth in a series, which has previously highlighted the education views of Council President T.J. Clarke and Council Members Glendowlyn Thames and John Gale].

As an environmental and civil rights attorney, Councilwoman Jennings serves on the Hartford School Building Committee and chairs the Council’s Parks and Recreation, Public Works and Environment Committee.  Here is her bio online; her major points of emphasis include two strands of thought in response to our questions.

On the Role of Council to help improve schools:

• Work with the Board of Education to:
  • reduce educational disparities;
  • increase Black, Latino, and male teachers in representative numbers;
  • help prepare children for the state’s workforce so they can support their families; and
  • bring “thoughtful input and discussion” when confirming mayoral appointments to the Board of Education.

On Education Priorities

• Take on the tough issues:
  • Reinvent math education so as to teach youth – and adults – to do math, with respect to ending the prison pipeline and address high-need occupational areas;
  • Train math trainers to improve those capabilities District-wide to overcome the school shortfalls “currently failing the majority of our children”, especially, as she advocates, given the importance of math in so many fields such as nursing, teaching, and engineering;
  • Find ways to engage faith-based, community, and governmental partners to make sure City efforts make a difference for Hartford children; and
  • Especially when Greater Hartford’s aviation or regional transportation hub needs are considered, the call for well-educated, workforce-prepared city children should not go unanswered.

Councilwoman Jennings notes the slogan of a 1972 candidate for the U.S. presidency – CongresswomanShirley Chisholm.  Like Ms. Chisholm, Councilwoman Jennings declares that she is “unbought, un-bossed and unafraid.”

The Bottom Line.  Councilwoman Jennings this morning pointed to the newly announced low SAT results in Hartford, particularly in math – one reason, she said, that she is teaching free train-the-trainer math classes in the city.  The disparity cannot get any greater, she said, with so few Black and Latino students meeting or exceeding the standard in English Language Arts and Math, as compared to white students [see our article on the SAT results here].  “These numbers support the School to Prison pipeline,” the councilwoman said in an email.