111 schools recognized for meeting five-year goal
FRANKFORT, Ky. (March 7, 2016) — In 2009-10, 34 percent of Kentucky high school graduates were prepared for college or a career. A five-year commitment to increase that number has resulted in 66.8 percent of 2015 high school graduates being ready for college or a career.
In 2011 all of the state’s 169 P-12 school district superintendents and local board of education chairs signed a pledge—known as the Commonwealth Commitment to College and Career Readiness—to improve career and college readiness.
Education Commissioner Stephen Pruitt recently recognized 111 Kentucky public school districts for making good on that pledge. Each of the districts had a unique goal to reach based on increasing its 2010 college- and career-readiness rate by 50 percent by 2015.
“Through hard work and dedication to their students’ needs and futures, the majority of Kentucky’s public schools met the commitment they signed in 2011,” said Pruitt. “The impact of this cannot be understated. As a result of the commitment being met, at least 15,000 more students have graduated ready to take the next step into postsecondary opportunities. This is tremendous, and puts the commonwealth on the right track as we look to build on the accomplishments of the past 25 years and provide each and every child with a world-class education that will lead them to success in their postsecondary endeavors, in the job market and life.”
The Commonwealth Commitment was tied to the passage of Senate Bill 1 (2009), which required that P-12 and postsecondary education leaders produce a plan to reduce remediation of high school graduates entering college by 50 percent.
In September 2010, campus presidents from Kentucky’s colleges and universities signed a resolution pledging their commitment to be full partners with the Kentucky Department of Education in preparing high school graduates to be college- and career-ready.
SB1 also mandated a new state accountability system for public schools that includes a college- and career- ready measure to emphasize the importance of schools focusing on marked improvement in this area.
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