One of the students present at the ribbon at the Sun Center of Excellence at St. Paul College in Minnesota cutting was Lance Daven. In his introduction, Lance mentioned he became Java certified in high school. I asked how he did that and he replied he’d attended St. Paul as a high school senior. I was familiar with the placement programs where high school students earn college credit by attending classes at their high school and then passing the test but this was something more.
Minnesota has a program called Post Secondary Enrollment Options (PSEO); this program allows high school students to attend class at a junior college and earn credit towards both high school and a college degree. This is a great idea to expand opportunity and access more disciplined approaches then may be available at a local high school. It reminds me of a recent article I read by Newt Gingrich in ‘Time’ magazine. In the article Newt Gingrich argues high school is too long and that we should start students in college much earlier. Maybe he's right - at least some classroom success demonstrates possibility.
Another thing I thought was cool was someone was wearing a red “The Power of You” shirt. This program promises scholarships to fill the financial gap between educational tuition, expenses and other financial assistance programs. They put the average cost per student at $900. $900 is money incredibly well spent to advance the skills and employability of citizens. The ROI on tax collections from the future earnings of those students is probably just a couple of years. It sounds similar to a program in Georgia called the “Hope scholarship”, but due to budget constraints “The Power of You” is under threat in Minnesota.
Finally one more note from the road. I curled while I was Minnesota. Not my hair. You know - the Olympic event you’ve probably seen at least once where people throw what looks like a round clothes iron on the ice towards a target, preceded by folks who want to make sure the ice is really clean by sweeping it. It's kind of like Bocce ball, only you quickly learn there's more physicality because of the penchant for clean ice, i.e. sweeping the ice ahead of the stone while running toward the target. (This makes the stone go faster and straighter. Also, I was never sore the following day after playing Bocce like I was after curling. Who knew housework was so much work? Minnesota was great. The air was cold but the people were warm, there was excitement all around regarding the opportunities for education and I look forward to St. Paul being a model for the next generation of students.
