District wins seven-year GEAR UP grant to start middle-school cohort, hire College Now partner

Eddie Hall, presenting to the South Euclid Lyndhurst Board of Education on Dec. 17, said the district has been awarded a federal GEAR UP grant that will run for seven years and will fund a multi-year program beginning with all sixth- and seventh-grade students.

The GEAR UP program is designed to boost academic performance and postsecondary readiness, Hall said. "GEAR UP is a grant," he said. "Just picture them as the money. College Now is the vehicle to help utilize the money and reach the families and the students." Hall told the board the grant will pay for a College Now representative who will work in-district to implement programming and coordinate family engagement.

The grant will support multiple components, Hall said: early financial-aid awareness, academic and social-emotional preparation, campus visits and career exposure, summer programming, family engagement nights and teacher professional development. He said the program will include tracking students through their first year after high school to measure long-term impact.

Hall described the district target population as a cohort that begins in sixth grade and follows the same students for the duration of the grant. For this award the district will include both every sixth-grader and every seventh-grader in the cohort rather than restricting the program to first-generation college students. "A big difference ... is we're getting both," Hall said.

Hall said the district already has hired a district staff member to work with the GEAR UP cohort and that ESC (Educational Service Center) partners will assist with compliance and data reporting. He said the program will measure academic outcomes such as Algebra I passage rates in ninth grade, attendance and on-time promotion, SAT/ACT participation, FAFSA completion and college enrollment rates. Hall noted a benchmark example discussed by the grant is pushing Algebra I passage rates to 60% or better.

Board members asked how GEAR UP work will relate to existing college-and-career work at the high school and how logistics will be managed. Hall said the College Now representative is an extra staff member paid through the grant who will work with the middle-school grade bands and will not replace existing high-school staff: "That person is specifically for there, only there," he said. Hall also said the ESC will help the district remain compliant with grant requirements and support data collection.

Hall gave examples of planned career-exposure activities, including campus visits to employers such as Swagelok and Lincoln Electric, and said districts can pick from a menu of GEAR UP-supported activities. He said family nights and events paid by the grant will be used to engage caregivers in financial-aid and college-readiness topics and that many typical program costs (swag, small field-trip subsidies, guest speakers) can be covered by the grant funding.

Hall said the district has already completed required application paperwork and hired at least one staffer funded by the grant and expects programming to begin after the winter holidays. He said the grant cycle is seven years and the district will begin implementation and planning in January.

The board did not vote on the grant at the meeting; Hall presented the program overview and answered board questions about staffing, ESC compliance support and program aims. He credited the ESC and College Now partnerships for helping with implementation and tracking.

Eddie Hall concluded by reiterating that GEAR UP expands the district's college and career work into the middle grades and provides both a staff person and programming funds to support sustained family engagement, student activities and data tracking over multiple years.