The “Voices of Concerned Citizens” outlined nine areas of concerns to be addressed by the Natchez-Adams School District Board of Trustees and Superintendent.

Number five on the list is economic development. I am not sure as to how the district can have a direct impact on economic development, but there are some tasks the district can employ in order to impact economic development indirectly.

Two such responsibilities are to ensure a quality education and provide a desirable educational environment in which students want to come to school and remain there. Schools shall serve as a safe haven for students and capture their interest. In order for this to occur, Natchez-Adams School District has to invoke two strategies in order to ensure students remain in school until they receive a diploma; preferably in four years or less. These two strategies are students choices and wraparound services.

Student choices are being addressed by the restructuring of schools. The restructuring at the middle and high schools allows students to choose which track they want to pursue in order to prepare them for life after high school. Programs are in place to prepare students to go to college, attend college before graduating from high school and/or prepare them for work through the District’s Fallin Career and Technical Center.

Wraparound Service is an intensive, individualized care management process for youths with complex needs. Wraparound Services traditionally focus on students with high emotional and disciplinary needs. With the many challenges adolescents face daily, wraparound-like services are needed for more than just emotional and disciplinary needs. Wraparound-like services for students in NASD will include a network of individuals willing to commit to seeing students enter Natchez Freshman Academy and, within four years, walk across the stage at Natchez High School with a diploma.

One such initiative in which wraparound-like services can be employed is with Goal ’17. Goal ’17 is a dropout prevention initiative that will be implemented to eliminate the dropout rate for students that enrolled in the ninth grade for the first time during the 2013-2014 school year. The name is derived from the district goal of reducing — if not eliminating — the dropout rate starting with last year’s freshman class who should graduate in 2017.

The aim of Goal ‘17 is to foster collaboration amongst the businesses, academic and service organizations within Adams County to work with and encourage all students to stay in school and reach their full potential to reduce the likelihood that some students will become involved in non-productive activities by addressing several areas of academic and social development.

Based on the most recent graduating cohort (2013-2014), Natchez has a dropout rate of approximately 27 percent. Even though the graduation rate in NASD has increased in the last two years and the dropout rate has declined, any one student that does not graduate has a negative impact on economic development. One student that has dropped out of school in Adams County can expect to make $10,386 less than a student that graduates from high school which will cost the taxpayers roughly $292,000 over a lifetime. This can and will have a devastating impact on economic development for our Adams County and Natchez communities.

This is an opportunity for NASD to address economic development. Come out at 6 p.m. Monday in the Natchez High School Auditorium to hear more details about the initiative. I am calling on all civic organizations, governmental entities, fraternities, sororities, religious organizations and individuals to come out to hear about how curbing the dropout rate will have a positive impact on economic development. Also, come to make a commitment as a community member to work to graduate 100 percent of our graduating class of 2017.

I do appreciate a formal list of concerns shared by the “Voices of Concerned Citizens” so that the district will begin to address them and contribute to moving the community forward.  This is one of a series of initiatives that will address the call for action as outlined by “Voices of Concerned Citizens.”

 

Frederick Hill is the superintendent of the Natchez-Adams School District.