Finding the formula to keep kids in school

Griswold - Griswold's public high school is known for its champion-caliber athletics, music and drama programs that are the envy of neighboring districts and a vocational component recently recognized as one of the state's best.

But there's something the town isn't proud of: a dropout rate that was nearly 20 percent in 2002 and about 16 percent in 2008.

"We really want to add the level of academic excellence to everything else we already have," said Superintendent of Schools Paul Freeman. "We have a very solid academic program, but we have excellence in other areas and we need to bring that one up to that level. I want it to shine … but without sacrificing everything else."

The school district was one of 23 invited to a Dropout Summit hosted last fall by the governor's office and the state Department of Education.

"None of us were happy about the dropout rate, but to say we were alarmed, no," school board Vice Chairman Stuart Norman Jr. said recently. "We knew we had too many kids dropping out, but at the same time it seemed to be a way of life. That was the community.

"It's got our attention. … I think as a board we feel we've reached a point that the school district is equipped to take it on … to make some really good things happen," he said. "We know how to do some things well, we have the foundation, we just need to apply that to the academics. We need to get people to buy into the excitement."

School officials not only have to improve the academic climate but also might have to change the culture of a town.

Strong work ethic

Like many of its neighbors along the Interstate 395 corridor, Griswold is an old mill village at its heart with a farming community on its outskirts.

For generations, hard work brought a good life, with or without a high school diploma.

"When I was a kid growing up everyone knew that if you were willing to work hard you could get a job, buy a house, have a car and have a better life," said Norman, a lifelong resident.

Now, in Connecticut only 37 percent of those aged 18 to 64 years without a high school diploma own their own homes, according to a study by the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston.

"That working hard ethic was a very important part of who we were and who we still are, and we still respect that," Norman said.

"It was part of the mentality: you don't have to graduate from high school or have a college education to succeed and our idea of success was different, get a job, watch the kids play sports. It's changed on us," he said.

The last operational mill in Jewett City closed last summer, another reminder that times are changing.

"The last 15 to 20 years … the whole technology thing, so much of our manufacturing has left, not for down South but you can't follow it now because it's overseas," Norman said.

As a local high school student in the 1960s, Norman had no intention of going to college. But as a star football player, he was recruited by Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine.

"My mother was proud when I went to college. She never finished her second year of high school … I couldn't talk to her about what courses I should be taking … because she didn't have that life experience," he said.

"We were not a bunch of people who didn't value education, but it wasn't as critical as it's become. Now it's necessary to have more of an education to have more options. We're all slow to change, maybe because we're slow to recognize change sometimes," said Norman, who after Bowdoin earned a law degree from UConn.

Dollar differences

The state held the Dropout Summit because "we know how closely the attainment of a high school diploma and a life of success are related," said Thomas Murphy, a spokesman for the state Department of Education.

In addition to Griswold, the other school district in southeastern Connecticut invited to attend was New London, which had a graduation rate of 81.1 percent in 2008

The median income in 2005 for a Connecticut employee who did not graduate from high school was $22,939, compared with $30,766 for an employee who had graduated, according to a presentation at the summit.

As more students leave the state to pursue higher education, and then don't return, Murphy said, the business community is turning to the cities and rural communities for its work force.

Yet, national projections based on U.S. Census data highlighted at the summit indicate that in two years there will be "a shortage of about 8.4 million workers who will need to hold a bachelor's degree and a surplus of nearly 3 million workers who hold a high school diploma or less."

The state wants to get communities like Griswold to begin talking about the dropout issue, Murphy said.

Staying on the right path

Each afternoon shortly after 3 p.m. the town's Youth Center comes alive with the sounds of video games, basketballs, guitars and, for the most part, laughter.

Its a relaxed atmosphere in which Ryan Aubin, the town's youth service bureau director, and Erika "Ricky" Bevis try to encourage teens and pre-teens to open up, ask for help or unwind.

One recent afternoon, a middle school-age girl was working on her homework while two boys played video games on a big screen television. Outside other boys played a pickup game of basketball or did tricks on their BMX bikes.

"It's basically our job to keep them in touch with the community and to help them understand the importance of staying in school," Aubin said. "We try to get them to think about their future, help show them a path."

"The hard part is how to make a kid feel stimulated by education ... it's a big question, because without having a heart in it, he or she won't do it," Aubin said.

On that spring-like day, Matthew Stevens, 19, sat with a friend in one of the center's homework rooms.

Stevens, a Massachusetts native who said he moved a lot while in school, finally settling in Griswold in his senior year, left school and hasn't returned nearly two years after he was scheduled to graduate from Griswold High.

He left school after focusing too much on trying to make new friends and falling too far behind, he said.

Stevens now lives in Norwich and has a job, which he said he "plans on keeping for a while."

He wants to finish school, maybe get into the credit diploma program at Norwich Adult Education.

Keeping a student in school is easier than trying to convince someone who has left to return, said Trooper First Class Frank Galley, the school resource officer.

"It's easier to show them there are other alternatives to getting in trouble, to stay in school and get an education," he said.

"We don't want them to throw in the towel. We bend over backwards to show them different options if they do leave, but I always tell them to just finish what they've started," he said.

When a student drops out, educators take it personally.

"Our product is our children," high school Principal Mark Frizzell said.

"We're not teaching just for college, we're teaching for life. That could be the military, a vocational trade or to enter the work force," Frizzell said.

Already working on it

In the long term, the district is focusing on reading at the elementary school and evaluating data to be more responsive to student needs at the middle school.

At the high school, the goal is to increase the level of cognitive engagement: to teach students how to think deeply about issues and how to apply that in the real world.

Academic achievements are now being celebrated. On the day before the Thanksgiving Day football game, the school held an academic pep rally with all the music and cheers that are traditionally part of an athletic celebration. Two weeks ago there was another rally, this time to psyche students up about the statewide achievement tests. Students who have excelled on the exam were honored and those who will graduate this spring received special gold or silver chords to wear over their robes.

At the elementary school level the honors come in stickers.

Erica Pelish-Sundstrom, parent of two elementary students, said it's little things - open communication between parent and teacher and the willingness to applaud achievement and not belittle students - that are important.

She said responsibility also lies with the parents, to provide a quiet place to do homework or take a teacher's advice on how to work with a child who needs extra help.

Freeman, the superintendent, said while the district has short-term initiatives to improve the graduation rate, such as re-establishing the Griswold Adult Education program, he also wants to use the school campus as a means to get children as young as preschoolers, and their parents, thinking of life after high school graduation.

For the first time, at this year's graduation, scholarships from the Gerald and Wanda Brunet Trust will go to students going to college. About $75,000 will be awarded from a trust established by Wanda Brunet, who died last year. She attended Griswold High School for two years but didn't graduate.

Freeman also is collecting the results of a survey of teachers, parents, administrators and business officials. He asked two questions: What are you most proud of and what should the school district improve?

"I think in three or four years Griswold will be recognized as an academic center, not just a theatrical or athletic center," Freeman said.

Frizzell, the high school principal, said he and other school officials are ready to meet that challenge.

"We have the school climate and initiative to build off of. It will only get better," Frizzell said.

m.bard@theday.com