Tuesday, February 08, 2000
CPS may expand Great Oaks tie
Vocational option works, Adamowski says
BY DANA DiFILIPPO
The Cincinnati Enquirer
A partnership that sends Cincinnati Public Schools students out of the district for vocational education classes has proved popular and successful enough in its pilot year that Superintendent Steven Adamowski will recommend its expansion.
Under an agreement with the Great Oaks Institute of Technology and Career Development, about 40 high-schoolers enrolled at Great Oakscampuses in Sharonville and Dent last fall.
A progress report in October indicated that most maintained grade averages of C or better and had 95 percent or higher attendance. Another progress report is expected this week.
Mr. Adamowski aims to allow another 100 students to participate in the 2000-01 school year. He'll recommend the expanded agreement at the school board's Feb. 14 meeting.
While the numbers are small compared with CPS' total enrollment of 45,600, the proposed expansion is significant.
The Great Oaks partnership is part of Mr. Adamowski's philosophies of decentralization and market-based competition, in which the district will transfer tasks — such as vocational education — to agencies or people likely to do them better. Administrators also hope it will help them gauge how best to provide vocational education for CPS students.
The district now offers “Career Paths” programs for work-minded high-schoolers, including hospitality, commer cial art, law/paralegal, cosmetology, recreation management, costume design, photography, auto technology, aviation and construction management.
Some are so popular they have waiting lists. But administrators don't want to expand vocational offerings until they consider a report due in April on how to overhaul the district's high schools, Associate Superintendent Kathleen Ware said.
One parent reported mixed feelings about the CPS-Great Oaks agreement.
“The opportunity has been the only good thing thus far,” said William Hagans Sr. of Westwood, whose son Zachariah is a junior studying automotive technology at Great Oaks. “He's had plenty of adjustment problems.”
Zachariah, who attended Western Hills High School last year and is African-American, is uncomfortable in the predominantly white school system, his father said. The stu dent body at Great Oaks' four campuses is 12 percent minority, and its staff 6.3 percent, Great Oaks spokeswoman Jean Ciancio said. In CPS, enrollment is about 75 percent minority; staff about 20 percent.
Zachariah must rise at 5 a.m. daily to catch the bus to get to school by 8 a.m., Mr. Hagans added.
“Why doesn't Cincinnati Public have this kind of program? Why do we have to send our kids out to the edges of the city, where the environment isn't all that receptive to them?” Mr. Hagans said.
School board President Rick Williams said that specialized teachers and equipment drive up the cost of vocational education, so the school board approved the agreement to see whether Great Oaks could more effectively and at less expense serve CPS' vocational needs. It's also a system of choice, so students who don't like it don't have to enroll, he added.
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