ToughQuestions
?It’s cool to do well at Granger,” exclaimed a 16-year-old we interviewed uring a break in her daily advisory meeting. “It didn’t used to be that way here, my sister told me…but that’s all different now. I’m hoping to go to the university in two years!” Located in Washington State’s rural Yakima Valley, Granger High School serves 388 mostly Hispanic students, 89 percent of whom qualify for free or educed-price lunch. Over the past eight years, the school’s 10th grade reading performance has steadily climbed from fewer than 20 percent of students meeting Washington state standards to nearly 80 percent. Parent attendance at student conferences has grown from a dismal 10 percent to almost 100 percent, and the graduation rate has soared to over 89 percent. As the staff’s expectations of and relationships with students have grown, everything about the school has improved. Two thousand miles to the east, in Saint Paul, Minnesota, 341 elementary students parade through the impoverished neighborhood surrounding Dayton’s Bluff Elementary School. They’re celebrating having accomplished their goal of
