Preparing students for the world

As students continue to enter an ever-evolving world and job market, school districts across Iowa are re-evaluating the skills students need to be successful and how best to teach those skills.

Following changes in 2012 to the education system that moved Iowa to a competency-based education, processes like building a Portrait or Profile of a Graduate have risen in popularity across the state. Recently codified universal constructs require districts to address and focus on helping students develop softer skills like communication, flexibility and productivity, and have pushed districts to look at more intentional ways to make sure kids are competent in areas outside of content specific subjects.

Jen Sigrist, the executive director of media and technology at Central Rivers Area Education Agency, works closely with districts to build individualized Portraits of a Graduate, which help identify a core set of skills a district hopes to address at every level of education.

'It's great because it engages the entire community. People are coming together to have a conversation about what they want for their graduates, and it applies to all students,” she said. When creating a portrait of a graduate, school districts generally seek input from local businesses and employers about what they feel are lacking in hires and how to address those issues.

'They don't need to have the content knowledge, but if they are self-starters and can persevere, have good communication skills and work well within a team, businesses are willing to train people,” Sigrist said, 'I only see Portrait of a Graduate increasing in popularity, across the state and across the nation.”

As of November of 2019, Sigrist said the AEA system knew of 63 districts across the state of Iowa that were investigating, already engaged or working toward creating a Portrait of a Graduate.

In southeast Iowa, Washington Community School District is in year two of a multiyear process to completely adopt their Profile of a Graduate.

Superintendent Willie Stone explained the district came together in the 2017-2018 school year and decided on six different skills (communicate, collaborate, contribute, persevere, innovate, think critically) with the goal of 'preparing their students to lead lives with purpose.”

'This year we're currently building our programs for ‘communicate.' We're working with every class to develop projects or activities to meet our six descriptors. And then we're building that into our curriculum,” Stone explained.

The superintendent noted the skills are something addressed at all levels, K-12.

'We met as a classroom, across grade-levels and then we met building wide, so we made sure we scaffolded all the way up. For example, our fourth grade is not doing something higher than our eighth grade,” Stone added.

Washington High School principal Eric Buchholz said a talk by Buddy Berry, an educator from Kentucky, inspired the district to begin the process of building a profile of a graduate.

'A big part of his talk was about what he wants his kids to be able to complete by the end of each grade,” Buchholz said. The principal said creating the profile allowed the district to further define their goals and re-empower the district's mission in education students.

'We had to decide as a high school what are the success criteria, what are the things our kids are going to do in each grade, to help fulfill those six characteristics before they get out of high school,” Buchholz said. The district plans to work on building the curriculum around two skills each year.

In terms of metrics and determining levels of success, Buchholz added the district will be looking at activities and projects that address specific criteria for each skill. Under ‘communicate' the district has identified five concrete metrics: students will speak and write clearly, listen actively, resolve conflict peacefully, engage with print and digital media and develop a responsible digital footprint.

'We've always taught these things, now it's just more intentional. Whether it's through sports or even having kids give a speech in an English class, it's always been there but we're being more intentional now,” Buchholz said.

While the content-specific learning is still a huge aspect of the district and particularly the high school, Buchholz noted the strength of using a Profile of a Graduate is that it addresses all students.

'These kinds of skills fit everybody. It's not the ‘I need to be able to do extremely well in an advanced level science because I'm going into science in college,' because that's a small percentage of all our kids,” he said.

Fairfield Community School District's superintendent Laurie Noll has also considered bringing Profile of a Graduate to her district.

Noll echoed sentiments that teaching focused on engaging skills to prepare students to become 'the workers that we need today … and provides 21st century skills,” is extremely important.

'Gone are the days that it's all rote information and learning. Now, it's how can we get our students to collaborate, communicate ideas, problem solve, come up with answers, that will empower our students to be the leaders of tomorrow,” she said.

Noll said she feels her district already does a good job of meeting the needs of students and using the Profile of a Graduate would simply centralize the language used to discuss teaching those softer skills.

'Hopefully we can look at it as a committee,” Noll added about potentially bringing the program to her district.

Similarly, administrators in the Mt. Pleasant Community School District have been making concerted efforts to address skills needed to be successful in the workforce.

Mt. Pleasant High School Principal Todd Liechty said that while the school hasn't 'gotten into the specifics that the profile would list out,” with a Profile of a Graduate, the district finds its guidance from its belief statements about providing students with the ability 'to communicate, problem solve and be skilled with technology.”

'I see the pathways to success as being two fold. First, that we offer the academic experience that prepares students for what they want to do when they leave whether it be more school or entry into the work force. The second part would be the soft skills of being good citizens and workers - showing up on time, working collaboratively with a group, good communication skills, good problem solving skills and creativity,” he said.

Liechty noted teaching these softer skills can be difficult, especially when educators feel students are not ready to venture out on their own, but is necessary and part of the learning process.

'In my opinion, we need to work to wean kids off their reliance on us and build their self reliance. But it is hard to give up control when we're not sure if they're ready,” he said, 'Kind of like when you're teaching your child to ride a bike. At some point you have to let go of the seat and let them ride by themselves. There may be skinned knees and elbows, which is a part of growing up. We just need to prevent more serious injuries and the easiest way to do that is to maintain a hand on the bike seat.”