Real Estate Titans Team Up With Higher Achievement for 3rd Annual GoingPlaces! Benefit

REAL ESTATE TITANS TEAM UP WITH HIGHER ACHIEVEMENT TO HELP DC YOUTH

Over $550,000 Raised for Middle School Academic Enrichment Program

(Washington, DC – October 12, 2010) In partnership with a team of DC business leaders, Higher Achievement (www.higherachievement.org) will present its third annual GoingPlaces! Benefit on Thursday, October 14 at the Warner Theatre in Washington, DC. The co-chair team includes Mitchell N. Schear (Vornado/Charles E. Smith), Michael J. Glosserman (JBG Companies), and Edward L. Cohen, Mark D. Lerner & Robert K. Tanenbaum (Lerner Enterprises). Higher Achievement will honor Steve Goldstein at the event, longtime champion and supporter of Higher Achievement. The program will also feature poetry and dance performances by Higher Achievement middle school scholars and a musical performance from the Austin, TX-based band, SKYROCKET!.

“The DC business community has shown a tremendous amount of support for Higher Achievement,” said Lynsey Wood Jeffries, Executive Director of Higher Achievement DC Metro. “This is the first time in the history of the GoingPlaces! Benefit that we’ve had five co-chairs, and it’s remarkable to see first-hand how their involvement impacts the lives of our scholars – everything from study supplies to field trips to special electives are possible because of support from our sponsors and guests.”

As a part of the event program, Higher Achievement will honor Steve Goldstein, retired Vice Chairman of Studley, former Chair of the DC Metro President’s Council and longtime supporter of Higher Achievement. “Steve has been actively involved with Higher Achievement for more than 25 years,” said Jeffries. “He has connected us with countless partners and donors, offered unconditional support and advice, and leveraged more than $1,000,000 in his time with us. Steve is a true believer in our scholars and a relentless champion of our work.”

The GoingPlaces! Benefit will begin with a cocktail reception at 6pm and a performance and award presentation featuring Higher Achievement scholars at 7pm. Dinner and dancing will follow.

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About Higher Achievement

Higher Achievement’s rigorous after-school and summer academic program gives youth from at-risk communities their best opportunity to succeed in middle school — and in life. Our research-based program challenges middle school students to meet their full potential in three key areas: academics, social skills, and leadership. When students get the skills and support they need to invest in their own success, they discover that they can be scholars. On average, 95% of Higher Achievement scholars who complete the program advance to top academic high schools and 93% advance to college. Higher Achievement currently operates achievement centers in Washington, DC, Alexandria, VA and Baltimore, and will launch two new centers in Richmond in 2011. www.higherachievement.org

Higher Achievement Partners with Up with People!

Thanks to long time supporters and board members Carlos Garcia and Bo Menkiti, Higher Achievement has been selected as one of three beneficiaries in the Washington, DC area who will partner with Up with People, a global education organization focused on bringing the world together through service and music. The Up with People cast members will share their talents in two showcases on October 22nd and 23rd, and the proceeds benefit Higher Achievement, D.C. Public Schools and Dance Place.

Up with People’s all-new production, “A Song for the World,” will take you on a tour around the world and back in time to the 50s, 60s and 70s. The show blends together original and popular songs ranging from traditional folk music, to hip-hop and rock. In between rehearsal times, Up with People will visit three Higher Achievement centers to engage scholars in activities such as diversity talks, geography trivia and a mini culture fair.

Tickets are on sale now at www.upwithpeople.org/dc! If you are interested in participating, but are unable to attend the show, please consider sponsoring a group of young people. For $120, you or your company can provide tickets for 10 students, giving them the chance to see Up with People, an international show that spreads a message of hope and possibility by encouraging and inspiring youth to do the same.
If you have questions, need more information or are interested in volunteering with Up with People on National Make a Difference Day, please contact Chelsey Panchot at 218.355.0239 or cpanchot@upwithpeople.org.

Event Details:

Who: Up with People
What: 'A Song for the World'—sponsored by Keller Williams Capital Properties
When: October 22, 2010 and October 23, 2010, 7:30 pm
Where: Columbia Heights Educational Campus - 3101 16th St NW, Washington, DC
Tickets: Adults-$20/$25 at the door
Kids- $15/$18 at the door
Beneficiaries: Higher Achievement, DC Public Schools, and Dance Place

OST Funding Threatens to Divide a Community

In 2009, as part of a coalition for afterschool policy convened by the Afterschool Alliance, Higher Achievement signed onto a letter to President Barack Obama, asking for his support for an increase of $250 million in FY 2011 for funding of out-of-school time programs through the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program. Now, almost a year later, the requested $250 million dollar increase has leveled out at $100 million, and the out-of-school time community is divided on how the allotment of these new funds will affect overall programming of the 21st Century Community Learning Centers (21st CCLC). 21st CCLC are currently designated to support after-school, before-school and summer learning programs, but with revisions from the current administration, many are concerned that experimentation with an extended learning day will over shadow the aforementioned program components.

Considering all of this, Higher Achievement is hopeful that three key components will remain at the top of the discussion:

There is a clear need. According to the Afterschool Alliance report “America After 3pm,” 15 million children are left unsupervised after school. To ensure that young people are safe and engaged in meaningful activities after school, it is critical that communities are able to offer more opportunities that engage youth outside of the traditional school day and year. Higher Achievement calls on policymakers to carry out the Senate HELP committee’s proposed $100 million increase for the 21st CCLC funding stream to ensure greater access to programs and activities for youth.

High quality is essential. Opportunities provided to young people should be of the highest quality, built upon research-based best practices for serving youth, including research on serving particular populations, age ranges, program field characteristics, and more. Poor and minority students living in the most vulnerable communities particularly need rigorous programs of the highest quality to ensure they have the same chances for success as their more privileged peers. High quality programs also incorporate best practices around staff development and training and other internal organizational best practices.

It takes a community. Legislation should encourage collaboration between schools/districts and community-based providers, as they combine to meet the year-round needs of youth both in and out of school. Collaboration must be grounded in aligned common goals and mutual accountability to be effective.

Higher Achievement Alumna Responds to Obama's Recent Back-to-School Speech

You see, excelling in school or in life isn’t mainly about being smarter than everybody else. It’s about working harder than everybody else. Don’t avoid new challenges – seek them out, step out of your comfort zone, and don’t be afraid to ask for help; your teachers and family are there to guide you. Don’t feel discouraged or give up if you don’t succeed at something – try it again, and learn from your mistakes. Don’t feel threatened if your friends are doing well; be proud of them, and see what lessons you can draw from what they’re doing right.

That’s the kind of culture of excellence you promote here at Masterman; and that’s the kind of excellence we need to promote in all America’s schools. That’s why today, I’m announcing our second Commencement Challenge. If your school is the winner; if you show us how teachers, students, and parents are working together to prepare your kids for college and a career; if you show us how you’re giving back to your community and our country – I’ll congratulate you in person by speaking at your commencement.

- From President Obama’s back-to-school address delivered at Julia R.Masterman Magnet School in Philadelphia.

In President Obama’s recent address to Philadelphia middle and high school students, he stressed a few key components that, if you weren’t paying attention, could serve as carbon copies to Higher Achievement’s mission, values and goals. Obama passionately spoke to the importance of an overall culture of excellence for student achievement, where working hard, stepping up to challenge, and being a leader is essential. He also spoke to what it means to really be successful, and how strong citizenry is a characteristic of success. As a Higher Achievement alumna and current staff member, I, as well as the more than 10,000 Higher Achievement alumni understand the roles that each of these skills can play within the road to success.

What Obama calls a culture of excellence, Higher Achievement affectionately refers to as a culture of high expectation. As a young student, I remember how comfortable I was being in the background. If the teacher didn’t call on me, I wasn’t going out of my way to get his or her attention. However, after joining Higher Achievement, I found myself surrounded by staff who expected more out of us as students; but even better, I was among students who wanted more for themselves and their peers. My entire academic approach was transformed by something as simple as expectation. Once excellence was expected of me, I strived for it.

Of course, striving for excellence doesn’t always lend itself to immediately achieving it and that was another one of the many lessons that Higher Achievement taught me. Now that I had my academic attitude adjusted, it was time to work on my academic work ethic. For example, if I studied considerably hard for a test, spent an extra hour or two going over classroom material, got together with my friends to make sure I had the test concepts and still made a C on the test, that didn’t mean my efforts were in vain. Instead, that was my opportunity to review my efforts, see what I could have done differently, and apply the lessons learned to the next test. This, I learned, was the very essence of working hard.

It wouldn’t be in the spirit of Higher Achievement to stop at setting the expectation and working hard. Here, I also learned to step out side of my comfort zone. Once I mastered what I was great at, it was time to conquer what I was only good, or maybe even bad at. Higher Achievement pushed me aggressively to the next level, but simultaneously made me feel supported. I knew that if I were to misstep, Higher Achievement would be there to catch me before I fell, and put me right back on track.

It is a combination of setting the expectation, working hard and stepping up to challenge, that ultimately builds leaders. Some of the world’s greatest icons are those who think big, step outside of the box, and in turn give back to their communities. Since 1975, Higher Achievement has harvested the inner-leader in inner-city youth across the District. Now, in 2011, I am more than proud to be apart of the expansion efforts that will ultimately cultivate potential in young people, who like me, didn’t even know they had it. President Obama addressed the students of Masterman on what was sure to be a very special day for them; Higher Achievement addresses its scholars everyday about setting high expectations and changing not only academic outcomes, but the world.

Join us in Richmond this Saturday!

The Higher Achievement Richmond staff is pleased to join our neighbors for Richmond Public Schools' Choice Campaign Kickoff in the 6th and 7th Districts on Saturday September 18, 2010. We'll be canvassing the community in support of educational excellence and spreading awareness of the new Higher Achievement Center opening on Richmond's Northside in June 2011. We believe that when an entire community bears the responsibility for educating our youth, our children succeed. We'd love for you to join us!

We're meeting Saturday, 10am, at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School, 1000 Mosby Street. To learn more about our upcoming efforts in Richmond or to set up a specific time to meet us on Saturday (or anytime!), email Tyren Franzier at tfrazier@higherachievement.org.


- Eleanor Rouse
Executive Director, Richmond

Alumnus Tariq West Reflects

Dear Richard,

I am writing you today to thank you. Thanks to you and Higher Achievement, I have accomplished more than I ever dreamed.

When I was eight years old, a wave of violence swept through my neighborhood. I went to sleep every night to the sound of gunfire.

The National Guard came with their humvees to set up huge banks of floodlights. For a week or more, the lights shone so bright that there was no night.

This was the backdrop of much of my childhood. Drugs and gangs were pervasive; in fact, it’s hard to even describe the sense of hopelessness that governed where I grew up.

I remember as a 10-year-old, a friend from my block asserting with utter confidence that we were never going to get out of the ghetto. “We were born broke and black,” he said, “and we’ll die that way.” Even as a child I understood how tragic a sentiment that was.

I struggled with what it meant to be a promising young person in a place where promise was crushed and squandered. How could I explain my ambitions to peers who had learned not to dream?

My parents were hard working, supportive and expected a lot of me, but their expectations were set against the powerful and destructive atmosphere that we lived in - mediocrity, failure, delinquency were the norms. It could have been all too easy to give up on my future.

Then I found Higher Achievement. It was the beginning of my coming into my own.

I just graduated from Stanford University. The day embodied the hard work and highest hopes of my parents and me. But we could not have done it alone. It was Higher Achievement that challenged and helped me grow at a pivotal point in my life.

Higher Achievement helped me opened doors in my life that I thought I could not have opened on my own. Now I know I can open those doors for myself, because Higher Achievement helped me build confidence, self-awareness and a sense of purpose in the world. Higher Achievement was a safe place for dreams.

Higher Achievement’s academic coaches and mentors helped me move beyond my struggles with mathematics, encouraged me to explore the world through the written word and helped me find my own voice. They believed in me and inspired in me a steadfast belief in my own ability.

Thanks to the skills and support I received at Higher Achievement, my grades improved dramatically. I attended a top-tier high school and studied alongside children who grew up in privileged environments. It was intimidating and alienating at times, but Higher Achievement had given me the tools I needed to succeed.

Now I’m a regular contributor to Higher Achievement and as I make the move back to the DC area I look forward to giving back as a mentor and as a friend of the program. My deepest hope now, and the reason I am writing to you today, is that I want children from all across the country to benefit from Higher Achievement as I did.

There is no question that Higher Achievement can make a difference. I am living proof.

The only question is how many children can be served. Thanks to the mentors and staff at Higher Achievement, I have accomplished things that once I couldn’t imagine. I feel compelled now to do everything I can to afford the same experience to every child who has dreams but lacks the means to achieve them.

Thank you, Richard, for your tireless faith in the promise of young people. Your commitment is inspiring and your vision of empowering youth is extremely necessary. Please let me know how I can help.

Sincerely,


Tariq West


P.S. I owe so much to Higher Achievement. The program met me in my neighborhood, among my peers and gave me the tools to achieve my dreams. While other kids hung out on the street, I’d begun the hard work of building my future.

Richard Tagle, CEO, On School Reform and Motivation.......

On September 6, 2010, Robert Samuelson authored, School Reform’s Meager Results. The op-ed identified what Samuelson believes to be the two main reasons that school reform has failed. First, no one has effectively brought to scale a transformative reform approach, and second, students lack motivation.

I agree with the first reason and suggest that we are asking the wrong question about scaling reform. Perhaps reform approach itself is not a “scalable” element. What need to be scaled are practices that have proven to improve student performance. District hiring practices, interactive classrooms, and team-based approaches to professional development have brought positive outcomes not just in schools, but also in other institutions that require system-wide implementation. This country knows how to scale. We have more than doubled the number of people in prison, have more than 8 million children uninsured, and have more than 20 million of people out of jobs. We know how to scale. The real question is whether we have the will to scale those practices that bring about positive change.

On Samuelson’s second point – student motivation – Higher Achievement has been fostering student motivation for over 35 years. Each student in the program devotes more than 650 hours of rigorous academic work in addition to the 900 plus hours they spend in school. By providing solid opportunities to learn, excel and shine, Higher Achievement motivates students to work hard and to be engaged in their learning. Students become motivated when they know people are investing time, energy and resources in them. When we see them as assets and talent and not just assembly line widgets, they respond by proving that they are worth the investment. They rise up to high expectations and meet challenging demands. We have to believe in their promise and potential before we can ask them to exert effort. This “belief” is also something this nation should learn how to scale extremely well.