Students at Kyrene de los Niños Elementary School are making strides toward college education at an early age.

Each classroom at the school chose a U.S. college to represent as part of the No Excuses University Network, a program that promotes higher education in elementary and secondary schools. This year, one third-grade class chose to adopt ASU.

On the daily morning announcements at Kyrene de los Niños, students cheer, “We are Niños, we are college-bound,” said Nancy Dudenhoefer, community relations manager for the Kyrene Elementary School District.

One of the school’s main focuses has been to involve parents in their children’s education and inform them about setting goals to achieve further education later in their lives.

“We need to help parents understand what their role is in setting high standards for their kids,” Dudenhoefer said.

Students in each classroom asked their college for donations, like pennants and T-shirts. The children also learned the universities’ fight songs and cheers.

At parent-teacher conferences, teachers urged parents to “Take 5,” which Dudenhoefer said means parents should “take five minutes out of their busy lives just to ask how their kids were doing in school and what goals they were working toward at school.”

Parents were also invited to attend one of the three meetings that will be held Sept. 15 to learn more about the No Excuses University.

The school’s faculty is also getting involved. Both students and staff members wear No Excuses University T-shirts every Monday and their university’s apparel or colors on Fridays.

Amaya Chatnan, a second-grader in Tammy Miller’s class, said representatives from her classroom’s university, Michigan State, came to visit students and encourage them to stay in school.

“You have to go [to college] so you can get smart,” said Chatnan, whose ambition is to become a doctor. “If you don’t go then you can’t get a job.”

Nicholas Appleton, a professor at ASU’s Mary Lou Fulton Institute and Graduate School of Education praised the program for getting students involved at the elementary level.

“Its important that kids start thinking at a very young age that college is for them,” Appleton said. “Many kids grow up in a household where it’s expected that they will go to college, so they begin to see themselves attending college and being successful. But many kids that don’t grow up in professional families, where college is expected, never even picture themselves attending college.”

Ana Gomez del Castillo, principal at Kyrene de los Niños Elementary School, said because many of these students are from a lower socio-economic group and many of their parents never attended college, it is especially important to inform them about it early on.

“We are planting the seed [in students’ minds] that college is something they can achieve, and we make it our goal to do everything possible to get them there,” Castillo said.

Reggie Lue, attendance clerk at Kyrene de los Niños said students are also enthusiastic about the prospect of furthering their education.

“This is the first time many of them have ever been talked to about college and it’s exciting,” Lue said. “They are excited about it, I mean they’ll come right up to you and tell you they are going to college.”

The No Excuses Network is part of TurnAround Schools, an organization that was founded on the two principles that “every child has a right to be prepared to attend college” and “it is the responsibility of adults in the school to develop exceptional systems to make that dream a reality,” according to the organization’s Web site.

TurnAround Schools organizes institutes for educators to learn proven teaching strategies and techniques.

Castillo and 17 teachers from the school attended a TurnAround School Institute in the summer of 2008 and were introduced to the No Excuses University Network, which they applied during the following year.

Castillo said that after the first day of the institute, she knew she wanted to be involved, and she and the teachers were “fired up” about trying to implement the program in their school.

“It’s designed to increase student achievement, and of course that is our goal at all of our [Kyrene District] schools. No matter what situation the student is in, we want to see them succeed,” Dudenhoefer said.

Castillo said she has seen a significant impact on her students.
“I can’t tell you how many students have come up to me and told me that they are going to college,” she said.

Reach the reporter at michelle.parks@asu.edu.