Terrebonne schools add new diploma program

It is a lifetime commitment of educators in Terrebonne Parish to ensure students follow the right path to success with education. And with the new Career Diploma Pathway program that will be implemented for the 2010-11 school year, that path has taken a new direction.

“This is the first time we are doing this with incoming freshmen,” Superintendent Philip Martin said. “Primarily, it has a multifaceted purpose to provide children with a career option if they aren’t planning on doing the college prep track so they are prepared to enter some kind of career.”

According to the Career Diploma Entrance Requirements document submitted to the Education and Policy Committee on Aug. 2, incoming freshmen can qualify for the Career Diploma Pathway in two ways. They may either meet the promotion requirements to enter ninth grade, or be 15 or older and score “approaching basic” on either math or ELA component of LEAP.

These students must also attend summer school, take the eighth grade retest, achieve a GPA of at least 1.5 during eighth grade and meet the minimum attendance requirements and behavior requirements.

“Retest opportunities happen in the summer,” Martin said. “We went out and sought out these kids so we didn’t leave anyone out, and everyone who has been offered it has accepted it.”

“In the ninth grade, the student must complete a remedial course for elective credit in the subject area of the component of the LEAP test on which he or she scored Unsatisfactory,” the document stated. In addition, the student must pass all remedial coursework, and participate in a dropout prevention and mentoring program.

“Hopefully, this will address drop-outs, because across the state we are losing kids who are dropping out,” Martin said, and also added students who choose to participate are not permanently locked into the program.

“It’s not like you don’t have a choice,” he added. “You can opt in and out of the program.”

The program encourages a working relationship between the student and parents as well to best determine the student’s career plans and possibly post secondary training. The student must also be informed of the pros and cons of the pathways.

“There must be a meeting with student, parent or guardian and counselor of administrator,” the requirements document said, in order for the student to fill out a Career Diploma Participation Form. The students and parents make the decision to participate based on the best interest of the student, and parents or guardians must sign the form.

“Basically, the graduation requirements stay the same, but course offerings are different,” Martin explained. “As [the students] begin going more toward the elective part of the program, that’s when they would elect a career.”

Martin said the program gives more students an opportunity to graduate.

“It provides an avenue to get into high school that didn’t exist before,” he said. “So I’m very excited about it.”