Rogers Program Brings Relevance To The Classroom

Seeking classes with relevance: Romeo and Juliet taught as an office romance, computer classes showing the how-tos of resume building.

Rogers High School is spending lots of time and money creating instruction that prepares students not for a multiple-choice test but for life’s tests.

Rogers’ GOLD program is leading the way. Aimed at keep freshmen in school and into their work, GOLD shows 14-year-olds the realities of the job market.

They learn that it’s almost impossible to survive on a $5-an-hour job. They learn that becoming a lawyer means more than eight years in college, that becoming a doctor takes 12.

Freshmen formerly took electives such as band or home economics. Now they get a peek at dozens of possible careers, what it takes to get there, and a few basic skills that will help.

“How many adults say, ‘I wish somebody had told me about this career or that career when I was in school’?” said Rogers Assistant Principal Mike McGuire. “We are trying to help kids make better decisions.”

“It’s everything they really need as far as life goes,” said teacher Edie Coleman.

The program was devised two years ago, when 13 percent of Rogers’ freshmen dropped out.

In the 1994-95 school year, staff and counselors began spending more time with students, and the drop-out rate decreased to less than 3 percent.

Last year, the first year that GOLD classes met, freshmen drop-out rates held steady.

This year, classes will have heavy emphasis on computer training, a skill administrators think is important for high school graduates.

The school received 18 new Macintosh computers during the spring and summer for a freshman computer lab. Students will get 12 weeks of keyboarding that includes instruction in creating a resume.

“We think by the end of the year we will have 520 kids who can sit down at a Mac, pop open Claris Works, pull up their electronic portfolio, spell-check, everything,” said McGuire.

The push concerns some humanities teachers who fear the classics are being replaced with utilitarian instruction.

Coleman, a language arts teacher, said she is challenged to put a modern face on an old script. Some of the stilted language in Romeo and Juliet becomes readable when students think about it as a modern romance.

“The problems in Romeo and Juliet were problems then. They are a problem today,” said Coleman.

“But you make it relevant, and they say, ‘Oh, I can see that.’ That’s why we are doing this.”

, DataTimes