By Paul Gattis
June 14, 2010
The sky is blue, the sun is bright and school is in session.
No, not a multiple choice question for which one doesn’t belong. But summer and studies are no longer mutually exclusive.
Impact Alabama, a not-for-profit organization, is sponsoring a tuition-free three-week course to help students prepare to take advanced placement classes in the fall or sustain the knowledge learned in just-completed AP classes.
The classes started June 7 at the University of Alabama in Huntsville with 30 students from Huntsville and Madison County. There are 90 more students taking the same courses in Birmingham.
The objective is to quickly expand it to lure more students away from the summer, at least temporarily.
“Hopefully, next year we will serve over 500 kids,” said Stephen Black, the president of Impact Alabama. The organization is partnering with the A+ College Ready program on the CollegeFirst classes.
With sponsorship funds from Boeing and the law firm of Maynard, Cooper and Gale as well as grant money, there is no cost to students.
But the benefits may well be priceless.
Glenn Baeske/The Huntsville Times
Sparkman High students Drema Jones, left, and L.J. Vining, third from left, keep their academic skills sharp at a CollegeFirst program with the help of University of Alabama in Huntsville tutors Thao Tran, second from left, and Daniel Brown.“Kids who take and pass just one AP exam from a course in high school are three times more likely to be successful in college,” Black said. “It’s the most immediate, concrete way to help ensure, as best you can, success in college.”
Melanie Dalton, an AP chemistry teacher at Sparkman High School who is also one of the summer program’s teachers, agreed.
“Statistically, that’s true,” she said. “If you take even one AP class, you tend to do better at university and complete your degree.”
The classes students are more focused on than summer vacation are chemistry, biology and calculus. And don’t forget that AP classes can translate into college credit.
“We’ve had students come in with as many as a whole semester’s worth of high school credits through AP,” said John Fix, the dean of the College of Science at UAH. “They are off to a flying start.”
The program also gives students a snapshot of the college experience by attending classes on campus and interacting with college students. In Huntsville, the 30 AP students work with 28 students from UAH and the University of Alabama.
“It’s also a time to mingle with college kids, which may sound like the softer side of the value of this,” said Tina Watts, who works in community relations for Boeing. “But you can’t overestimate the value of college students having concrete conversations with these students.”
But what about the students who could wistfully look out the window on a hot summer day? For two students, Drema Jones and L.J. Vining, it didn’t matter because they were more attentive to their chemistry lab.
“It’s a prep for AP chem because a lot of us need the extra practice and work to get ahead and do better in school,” said Vining, a rising junior at Sparkman.
And in this world that promotes getting ahead, these students are getting ahead.
“I think they should (take the class) if they want to improve their academic level,” said Jones, another rising junior from Sparkman. “And it’s also free.”
Hey, mixing economics with chemistry. All the better.
