Temple High School Principal J.J. Villarreal presented his preliminary plans for the ninth grade to adopt a cohort advocacy program as part of the new Temple High School academy system.
The dream
After looking at school districts across the country, administrators were inspired to adopt the new ninth-grade model after visiting Caprock High School in Amarillo, which had fantastic results by using the cohort system.
The reason this school was such an encouragement was because they had a similar student population and nearly identical demographics and by using this model it went from a 50 percent retention rate from ninth grade to 12th grade to a 93 percent retention rate.
Staff turnover was also under 10 percent as opposed to 27 percent in Temple. The teachers who visited the Amarillo school said the staff seemed satisfied with their jobs and eager to help their students. Armed with a plan and a vision, the teachers returned to Temple to convert the high school to the cohort and advocacy system.
The Advocacy Cohort Model
Starting in the fall of 2007, Villarreal said they will have a working ninth-grade cohort advocacy hybrid model in place. The basic premise is that ninth-grade students will be separated from the rest of the school with its own principals and counselors. Villarreal said one of the plans right is to create teams of teachers in the core subjects - math, science, English and social studies - that share the same students to collaborate and plan to help students improve. If a student is doing well in science but poorly in other subjects, the science teacher can share what teaching methods work better with the rest of the team.
Villarreal said this model adds to the personalization of the education. Students will have more of the same teachers and classmates to maintain consistency, and teachers will be able to catch students slipping in academics much faster than in the current system. Teachers and counselors will be able to keep parents in the loop easier because instead of worrying about all ninth-graders they can focus on the group in their
