
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 17, 1995                   TAG: 9505170051
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HELPING KIDS GET TO COLLEGE

COLLEGE can be put out of reach for some students not by their lack of ability but by their lack of vision. If they don't see college as a possibility, they won't work toward it. Or, if they do envision it, the dream goes unfulfilled because they have too little knowledge of what's necessary to get there.

Roanoke schools' Partners for SUCCESS aims to fit some of these kids with glasses for bringing the future into better focus. The hard work of succeeding still is up to the kids. But they'll get help in learning how to go about it.

The program - a partnership between city schools, Roanoke Valley colleges and First Union Bank - is a promising investment in the valley's future. In developing the program, school Superintendent Wayne Harris has again displayed his own no-nonsense vision for the city's schoolchildren, a vision that involves responsible behavior, solid instruction and student achievement.

In setting clear, tough disciplinary standards, including expulsion for carrying guns, Harris has sent a message that the schools will not protect youngsters whose actions endanger others: The schools are to be safe places in which to learn and prepare for success in society. At the same time, however, the schools will reach out to students who perhaps have low expectations of life and their place in it, but who, with encouragement, could do much better.

If these kids' eyes can be opened, if they can recognize the opportunity and grab it with both hands, Partners for SUCCESS can open their lives to possibilities that before seemed to them either beyond their grasp or unrealistically easy to achieve. Neither view points the way to success.

Partners for SUCCESS should help lift the fog. Starting next year with 65 eighth-graders, the program will draw from 130 students recommended by teachers as showing the academic promise to succeed in college, though some have had academic or behavioral problems. With mentoring,

tutoring, and financial and medical assistance, able students who otherwise might not apply to college will get a chance to earn a degree.

Participating colleges - Hollins and Roanoke colleges, and Virginia Western Community College - will guarantee admission to students if they graduate from high school and meet entrance requirements. First Union will help with financial planning.

For their part, the students must maintain a 2.5 grade-point average, get no D's or F's, graduate with an academic diploma, and take the normally prescribed college-entrance examinations. Minimal performance standards for the college-bound, it might seem to some. But for kids who otherwise wouldn't be considering college at all, they sound like realistic standards that will require a little stretch.

With academic-enrichment sessions at the colleges during the summer, and the help of mentors and tutors, students should be set to enter college prepared to do the work.

The financially disadvantaged but brilliant student can be assured of a college education on scholastic ability alone. The financially disadvantaged student who is merely bright may not shine enough to attract much attention or help. And if the student has been disruptive, he or she is likely to have attracted the kind of attention that will only hurt.

But with maturing, higher expectations and a realistic understanding of what's required to prepare, many of these students could do well in college. With Partners for SUCCESS, some of those kids now should have a better shot at it.

by CNB