Students from Kaimuki, Nānākuli, Wai‘anae and Waipahu High Schools spoke today to the Hawai‘i State Legislature about the college access program GEAR UP and the impact it has had on their success in high school and aspirations for college.

GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) is a college access program funded by the U.S. Department of Education. Since its inception in 1999, GEAR UP has improved educational outcomes for millions of low-income students across the United States. This week, Hawai‘i celebrates the success of its GEAR UP programs as part of National GEAR UP Week.

There are three GEAR UP programs in Hawai‘i: GEAR UP Hawai‘i, GEAR UP Waipahu and Holomua GEAR UP. Each program collaborates with the Hawai‘i State Department of Education (HIDOE), the University of Hawai‘i (UH) System as well as the government, nonprofit and private sectors to provide information, encouragement, support, resources and services to over 20,000 students statewide to help eliminate achievement gaps among groups traditionally underrepresented in higher education.

The Eastern Wyoming College GEAR UP program has implemented a Parent Advisory Board (PAB) to promote the discussion and development of a shared vision of the educational needs of all EWC GEAR UP students. PAB provides a forum for parents to share their opinions and ideas with each other, the school GEAR UP staff, and EWC GEAR UP Director Judy Brown.

The PAB is made up of volunteer parent representatives from each EWC GEAR UP school. Members of the initial PAB are Theresa Wilhem, representing Glendo schools; Melisa Wilhoit, Torrington; and Tori Hunt, Lingle and Southeast schools.

The PAB will attend monthly GU meetings in the school they represent, and offer assistance, advice and feedback to the EWC GEAR UP staff. PAB will aid the GU staff with monthly meetings, set up, notifications and reminders to parents who have students enrolled in the EWC GEAR UP Program, which they are welcome to attend.

PAB will attend tutor training each year to become more informed regarding the GEAR UP program in their school.

The highest-scoring Canyon County district was Notus, a small district of about 410 students in a rural part of the county between Caldwell and Parma.

Notus school district staff said they were pleased with the results. About 47 percent of test takers met the math college readiness benchmark. This is the highest percentage meeting the benchmark of the Canyon County districts.

Fifty-nine percent met the reading and writing benchmark.

District staff feel the students excelled in answering "real-world problems." Part of that is attributed to their GEAR UP grant that provided extra support for the students, according to superintendent Craig Woods and secondary counselor Lorrie Houston.

Stephanie Lewis and one of her students both cried when he graduated in the spring from South Pittsburg High School in Tennessee, where she teaches English.

He’d done something she admits she wasn’t sure he could: finish high school fully prepared to go right to college.

That’s a feat a surprising number of high school graduates fail to accomplish. Half a million, or about one in four, show up on campuses each fall not ready to take college courses in math or English, according to the advocacy organization Education Reform Now. In Tennessee, only 17 percent of public high school students score at college-ready levels in English, math, reading, and science on standardized tests.

It’s a little-noticed problem that forces these students to relearn material they should have already known, discouraging huge numbers of them from ultimately getting their degrees and costing the nation, by various estimates, between $1.5 billion and $7 billion a year.

But the idea of solving it in high school is as rare as it is seemingly obvious.

“This is how it should be done,” said Alexandra Logue, executive vice chancellor and university provost for the City University of New York, or CUNY, system. “It is, however, more complicated than it sounds. You have to have everyone agreeing on what the standards are. And there are timing issues. When do you find out the student needs this, and how does that connect with when you provide the support?”

High schools in many parts of the country are judged on the proportion of their students who graduate, whether or not those students are ready for college. Surprisingly, scoring “proficient” on state-mandated standardized tests required to receive high school diplomas, also does not necessarily mean that students are prepared for college-level work.