Three years ago, Angelique Serrano was on her way to becoming a high school dropout. She attended a big school where no one noticed if she missed a few days, and she started cutting class—a lot.
“I would only go to the classes that I liked,” Serrano, now 18, said. “Instead, I would hang out with my friends or just leave early.”
Today, Serrano is college-bound and one of 10,000 City students given a second chance at graduating thanks to an innovative program called Learning to Work. Launched in 2005, Learning to Work gives academically struggling students in-depth job-readiness training—including paid internships—while they finish high school. It’s offered in 53 transfer high schools, night schools called Young Adult Borough Centers, and GED programs.
Serrano left her large high school to attend Liberation Diploma Plus, a small transfer high school in Coney Island. There, she got back on track to graduating and gained work experience as an administrative assistant at the school.
“My internship helped prepare me for the real world,” Serrano said.
“I believe having the Learning to Work program has helped students to be better engaged in the learning process,” said April Leung, Principal at Liberation Diploma Plus Transfer High School, where 78 students earned a diploma last year. “Some of our students intern right here at the school, and others work in other places in our community. Our students have worked in internships at Congressman Ed Town’s office, Community Board 13, local daycare centers, and the Jewish Community Center, to name a few.”
The schools and programs where students participate in Learning to Work are designed to re-engage the City’s most at-risk students—those who have fallen behind in traditional high school by more than two years. Historically, only 19 percent of students who are behind by more than two years eventually earn diplomas in traditional high schools. In transfer schools like Liberation Diploma Plus, results are much more promising.
Most transfer schools have more than doubled students’ likelihood of graduating, according to the 2007-08 school Progress Reports. The highest performing transfer school posted a six-year graduation rate in 2008 of 72 percent.
In January, Serrano will enter Brooklyn College and study early childhood education.
“I always wanted to be a teacher. I loved attending school when I was young,” Serrano said. “I want to give back, and show kids like me that you can come from nothing and now I’m something.”