Getting students into college, and through it, depends on more than academics. The InformED Report for January 18, 2017 looked at two kinds of help that schools often leave to chance: guidance from a counselor, and a working knowledge of money. It covered new state spending on counseling, the case for clearer guidance for transfer students, and efforts in North Carolina and Wisconsin to teach financial literacy. The spotlight went to a reading project in hospitals in the United Arab Emirates.
In this edition
- Nearly 3 in 10 U.S. pre-K-12 schools had no counselor, even as research tied counseling to college-going, and several states added funding.
- Community college students who want a four-year degree needed clearer road maps for transfer.
- Fidelity Investments trained North Carolina teachers in personal finance, and Wisconsin lawmakers weighed a statewide financial literacy requirement.
- Wanna Read?, a nonprofit in the UAE, builds libraries in children’s hospital wards.
States invest in school counselors
Writing in Education Week, Catherine Gewertz reported that several states were investing in school counseling in response to mounting evidence that counselors help more students finish high school and enroll in college. Minnesota had announced a $12 million effort to send counselors, social workers, nurses and school psychologists into 77 schools. Tennessee placed college advisers in 30 high schools with below-average college-going rates, funded by $7.2 million over three years.
The need was large. An Education Week analysis of federal data found that nearly 3 in 10 pre-K-12 schools had no counselor, and that there were 482 students for every school counselor nationally, against the American School Counselor Association’s recommended maximum of 250. A report from the National Association for College Admission Counseling found that meeting one-on-one with a counselor about college or financial aid tripled students’ chances of going to college. A 2013 College Board study estimated that each added high school counselor predicted a 10-percentage-point rise in four-year college enrollment. Those are associations rather than controlled trials, but they point the same way.
For district leaders, the article raised a familiar budget question. Counseling took heavy hits in the layoffs of the Great Recession, and remaining counselors are often given test administration and other duties that crowd out college advising.
Better road maps for transfer students
In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Stephen J. Handel wrote that the challenges facing community college students who want a four-year degree were well documented. The least-prepared students are encouraged to begin at two-year colleges, which have no admission requirements and cost far less. Handel argued that these students needed better road maps, meaning clearer guidance on how to move from a two-year program into a four-year one. A student who leaves high school for community college with a bachelor’s degree in mind still needs advising, and the counseling gap does not close at the college door.
Teaching teachers, and students, about money
At Fidelity Investments’ campus in Research Triangle Park, K-12 teachers from across North Carolina attended a free, one-day financial literacy session run with the nonprofit N.C. Council on Economic Education, David Ranii reported in The News & Observer. When the trainer asked who had ever failed to pay a bill on time, roughly 60 teachers raised their hands. The aim was to help teachers manage their own finances and pass that knowledge on. Tom Ryan, a Fidelity senior vice president, said teachers find it hard to teach a subject they do not feel confident about in their own lives. Ranii cited a 2009 University of Wisconsin-Madison study that found just 37 percent of K-12 teachers had taken a college course with financial education content, and fewer than 20 percent felt “very competent” to teach personal finance. One teacher told the paper that earlier lessons in financial literacy would probably have meant a lot more in savings.
In Wisconsin, the Post-Crescent’s Rory Linnane and Keegan Kyle reported that Appleton schools had long required a personal finance class, and that students often rethought their college plans once they set tuition and loan payments against expected income. Many Wisconsin districts did not require such a course, and lawmakers were considering a statewide requirement, though it was unclear whether funding would come with it. For school leaders, both stories made the same point. A financial literacy requirement is only as strong as the teachers asked to deliver it, and preparing them takes time and money.
InformED Report spotlight: books on the children’s ward
The spotlight went to the United Arab Emirates, where Gulf News’s Sanya Nayeem reported on Wanna Read?, a nonprofit created in 2013 by Shaikha Shamma bint Sultan bin Khalifa Al Nahyan. It builds libraries in hospitals’ pediatric wards. By the time of the report it had distributed more than 5,000 books to 13 reading rooms in hospitals across the country. For children who cannot leave their beds, volunteers bring book trolleys so the books come to them.
Its founder described three goals: promoting literacy among young patients, encouraging parents to take part, and inspiring community service. The article placed the project against research linking hospital stays with depression in children. A library cannot treat that on its own, but it gives children a choice and makes the ward a more hopeful place.
Further reading from that week
- The Daily Cardinal: Peer facilitated courses offer students lessons for current, post-college finances
- Vermont Business Magazine: Center for Financial Literacy gets $120,000 grant for teacher training, will restart Champlain College summer program
- University of Delaware: Financial Literacy Education
Sources
- Catherine Gewertz, “States Beef Up School Counseling Corps,” Education Week, December 13, 2016.
- Stephen J. Handel, “Transfer Students Deserve Better Road Maps,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, January 2017.
- David Ranii, “Teaching teachers the ins and outs of financial literacy,” The News & Observer, January 2017.
- Rory Linnane and Keegan Kyle, “Lawmaker seeks more student financial literacy,” Post-Crescent, December 20, 2016.
- Sanya Nayeem, “Getting children to a positive place through the pages of a book,” Gulf News, December 19, 2016.
- Wanna Read?, organization website, archived January 2017.
About the InformED Report
The InformED Report is edCircuit’s short news program on education. This edition first ran on January 18, 2017. In 2026, edCircuit re-presented it with a new anchor and this full written account. Both report the stories as they stood on that date and link the original reporting, so readers can see exactly where each claim came from.
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