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Almost two years ago, the National Council for Community and Education Partnerships (NCCEP) welcomed Career & College Clubs into its portfolio of programs. The journey since, expanding the program’s content and sharpening its impact, would have been more difficult–and less successful–without the ACT Holistic Framework and partnership with the ACT research team.

The Career & College Clubs program was created ten years ago by the nonprofit ALL Management Corporation for the purpose of helping middle school students get an early start on college and career planning. The program transferred to NCCEP in 2016, with the intent of reaching more students.

As the national voice for the federally-funded Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) program, NCCEP works with entities across the country to ensure underserved students have the opportunity, skills, and knowledge they need to pursue their career and life goals through the completion of postsecondary education. Career & College Clubs was a welcome addition to NCCEP’s portfolio of content and services.

But there was one immediate program need: to expand the Career & College Clubs curriculum to include high school students. The GEAR UP program serves students from 7th through 12th grade, and typically into the first year of college. For Career and College Clubs to effectively serve GEAR UP students, the curriculum needed to be expanded, updated, and further grounded in a research framework.

Enter ACT and the Holistic Framework.

NCCEP and ACT have partnered on a number of initiatives, so it was natural for us to initiate a conversation when we started this project. The discussion resulted in many good ideas which, in turn, led to a robust, year-long collaboration.

At the heart of that collaboration was ACT’s Holistic Framework, a guidepost for defining an individual’s preparation and success beyond academics to include factors that encompass college and career readiness. What Career & College Clubs had been doing in a piecemeal, almost serendipitous way, ACT had codified and systematized in the Holistic Framework. The Holistic Framework’s acknowledgement that academic readiness alone is not sufficient preparation for college and career success strongly resonated with Career and College Clubs’ on-the-ground experience.

Using the Holistic Framework to inform our work, we spent most of 2017 creating the new, 7th through 12th grade edition of the Career & College Clubs curriculum.

The new curriculum is based on grade-level standards and focused on ensuring students are fully prepared to succeed after they graduate high school. Informed by the Holistic Framework, the curriculum is divided into five, interrelated content areas:

• College and Career Preparation/Readiness – Students explore their interests, career possibilities, college systems, admissions requirements, and financial aid. 
• Academic Preparation – Students identify and demonstrate successful academic behaviors, and develop and implement academic plans for high school and beyond. 
• Leadership Development – Students practice leadership skills and explore their relationship with their local community and the world. 
• Social and Emotional Learning – Students identify and practice skills for managing emotions, building relationships, and decision-making. 
• Professional Etiquette – Students learn and practice successful behaviors in professional settings, such as how to prepare a resume and interview for a job. 

The curriculum is now in schools and nonprofit organizations across the country. As we grow, our partnership with ACT has shifted from building curriculum to measuring impact. Taking the lead on measuring impact is Alex Casillas, Ph.D., ACT Principal Research Psychologist. Dr. Casillas developed a comprehensive Theory of Action and research design to measure both short and long-term impact. The results will be used not only to demonstrate impact, but also to refine the curriculum over time.

The work between NCCEP and ACT has been a true partnership. With the Holistic Framework, NCCEP has built a more effective curriculum informed by ACT’s research and expertise, and ACT will be able to measure the effects of the Holistic Framework using a robust dataset. Most importantly, thousands of students will receive the support they need to pursue their goals and aspirations.

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The ACT Center for Equity in Learning hosted a summit on social and emotional learning (SEL) and issues important to student success on June 4 and 5 in Austin, Texas. The 2018 summit, Equity Through SEL: Supporting Student Success in the Transition to Post-Secondary, was attended by high school and post-secondary thought leaders, including Tom Vander Ark, CEO of Getting Smart.

For nearly 60 years, the ACT® test has played an essential part in higher education admissions and scholarship decisions. For the last three years, the nonprofit developer of the test has been expanding beyond traditional measurement to new and broader ways to promote education and workplace success.

“ACT is migrating from a focus on learning measurement to learner success,” said Jim Larimore who leads ACT’s Center for Equity in Learning (@ACTEquity).

Last year, ACT invited educational institutions to explore, evaluate and align to the ACT Holistic Framework™. It organizes knowledge and skills organized into four broad domains in learning progressions from K through career:

• Core academic skills in the areas of literacy and language arts, mathematics and science. 
• Cross-cutting capabilities, such as critical thinking, collaborative problem solving, and information and technology skills. 
• Behavioral skills related to success in education and the workforce, such as dependability, working effectively with others, adapting, and managing stress. 
• Education and career navigation skills related to education and career paths, including self-knowledge of abilities, values, likes, and dislikes; knowledge about majors and occupations; and skills related to education and career exploration, planning, and decision making.

Acquiring Success Tools

Under the leadership of Dutch born CEO Marten Roorda, nonprofit ACT is making inroads in personalized and adaptive learning.

In 2016, ACT acquired OpenEd, the San Francisco-based startup with one of the largest collection of standards-aligned open resources and developed an adaptive assessment system. OpenEd’s capabilities enabled ACT to introduce ACT Academy™, a free online learning and test prep platform.

With a 2017 acquisition of ProExam, ACT gained access to a leading social and emotional learning powerhouse. It then introduced ACT Tessera®, a multidimensional grade 6-12 assessment for social and emotional learning, and a digital credentialing capability.

ACT licensed a college readiness platform from NROC and introduced ACT CollegeReady™ to help students address their individual academic needs in math and English. ACT also pioneered supports to English learners for the ACT test, helping them obtain a college reportable score.

Promoting Social and Emotional Learning

“We’re at a tipping point for SEL in K-12,” said Jonathan Martin, ACT program director of K12 Consulting Services. Martin believes that SEL in K-12 could be widely adopted very soon.

It took a quarter century, but there is growing evidence that Martin is right. The acronym was coined by Tim Shriver and Dan Goleman. Shriver was interested in social learning (as discussed in this podcast). Dan Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence, argued for emotional learning. They settled on social and emotional learning (SEL). In 1994, Shriver and Goleman were among a notable group of scholars and practitioners that founded The Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL).

SEL “is the process through which children and adults acquire and effectively apply the knowledge, attitudes, and skills necessary to understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions,” according to CASEL.

The ACT Holistic Framework (above) incorporates SEL into many of its 50 subcomponents and skills, explained research psychologist Alex Casillas. This enables measurement, early warning and interventions.

Martin hopes to see the majority of American elementary schools taking proactive steps to incorporate social and emotional learning across the curriculum and into the culture. He said high schools are coming around. (Many of Getting Smart’s 100+ middle and high schools worth visiting have fully incorporated SEL into culture and curriculum.)

Jim Larimore leads ACT’s Center for Equity in Learning, which hosted a recent convening on social and emotional learning, bringing together more than 250 students, teachers, scholars, practitioners, and foundation executives to discuss equity through SEL and support student’s success in the transition to postsecondary.

“We’re committed to helping people achieve education and workplace success,” explained ACT CEO Marten Roorda. And while many of us are considering lexicon and measurement, “we know the importance of getting SEL right.”

While Larimore shares Jonathan Martin’s optimism about the rapid adoption of broader aims, he acknowledged “We are closer to the beginning of this journey than the middle or the end.”

Environmental Considerations

“Context shapes behavior,” said Dena Simmons (@DenaSimmons) Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. And there’s a lot that gets in the way for many youth: poverty, low school funding, implicit bias, exclusionary discipline policies, low engagement, and a lack of trauma informed practices.

Emotional intelligence, explained Simmons, is ''The ability to monitor one's own and others' feelings, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide one's thinking and action.'' (Salovey and Mayer, 1990).

“You can’t be emotionally intelligent without being culturally responsive,” said Simmons. Responsive practices create opportunities to get to know students, invite their lives into teaching, and respect life experience as official knowledge.

Getting to equity will involve tradeoffs, Simmons said. She asked “What are you willing to give up?”

SEL as a Priority

Brooke Stafford-Brizard directs the Whole Child Initiative at CZI. They take a comprehensive view of youth development including academic, social and emotional, cognitive, identity, mental and physical health (see more from Jim Shelton). They are particularly focused on context variables (e.g., trauma, bias, homelessness) and equity.

On measuring the developmental factors that matter most, CZI supports Todd Rose’s research on individual differences and the Summit Learning platform which helps more than 330 schools develop and track habits of success.

Jenny Nagaoka (@JennyNagaoka, @UChiConsortium) outlined her readiness research which points to agency and integrated sense of identity as well as traditional competencies. She said educational transitions are particularly fraught and going to college is a big milestone. Students need a variety of developmental experiences supported by strong sustained relationships added Dr. Nagaoka.

Karen Pittman leads The Forum for Youth Investment and is one of 25 commissioners of the Aspen Institute National Commission on Social and Emotional and Academic Development (@AspenSEAD). “The Commission is reimagining education based on how learning happens,” explained Pittman.

ACT’s 2015 report Beyond Academics: A Holistic Framework for Enhancing Education and Workplace Success challenged current thinking around college and career readiness and student potential.

The introduction of the ACT® Holistic Framework™ just a few years ago underscored the importance of taking a holistic view of an individual—not only to better understand whether an individual is ready for the next step in life but, more importantly, to use that information to help guide students in taking that next step toward a meaningful and fulfilling career.

As ACT evolves from an assessment company into an organization focused on learning, measurement and navigation, the Holistic Framework has become more than just a framework; it has become the DNA of ACT.

The framework helped change who we are, what we do, and the very way we work.

One of the first steps we took in our evolution was to evaluate how our current product portfolio aligned to the Holistic Framework. For example, since the framework suggests social and emotional learning (SEL) skills are critical, do we have a solution that measures SEL skills for individuals at different stages in their lives? For elementary students? For workers? In this case, the answer was only a partial yes, so we documented the gaps that existed and then began searching for ways to effectively close them, to better serve our customers.

In fact, we went beyond that: We established “becoming holistic” as a corporate goal with associated metrics to keep us accountable and track our progress toward filling those gaps.

As we studied this situation, we quickly realized that filling the gaps would take us far too long if we tackled this problem on our own. So, we set out to find strategic partners, investments, and acquisitions that would help us fulfil our goal. Of course, we continue to focus on creating the right solutions to serve our customers through internal product development, but we also are growing a network of partners to help us develop new solutions more quickly.

We know we cannot tackle all the existing gaps at once. So how do we prioritize our focus? How do we decide which gaps to address first? Through research. ACT has always been a research-driven organization. We are using research to shed light on which gaps are most important for individual success based on scientific evidence while also factoring in market and customer needs. And external factors, such as changing market needs and emerging opportunities, also influence the decisions we are making to meet our goals and foster the evolution of our organization.

Through it all, the ACT Holistic Framework serves as a guidepost for our work and for our organization’s transformation.

Just as the Holistic Framework can help guide individuals toward reaching their goals, it is helping ACT reach its own goal of developing and offering the right solutions to improve outcomes and enable ACT to most effectively fulfil its mission: helping people achieve education and workplace success. The ACT Holistic Framework has truly become the DNA of ACT.

Learn more about the Holistic Framework by visiting https://www.act.org/content/act/en/college-and-career-readiness/holistic-framework.html

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ACT is a leader in our community and in the world of measurement and learning. Our brand is based on trust: Trust in our quality and trust in our service. We care, about our community and our customers.

I am proud of ACT for actively supporting Pride Month because it shows our team members and those we serve around the world that we care about them and about nurturing a culture of openness, inclusion, trust, and respect. At ACT, we want everyone to feel included, heard, understood and supported.

I know that in our community and world there remains explicit and implicit bias against LGBTQ+ youth and adults. From my work on the school board in the Iowa City Community School District I have seen school climate survey results that showed LGBTQ+ youth were significantly less likely to report that they felt they belonged in school, that school staff supported them, and that their contributions were valuable. These findings were unacceptable to the school board and district staff, and our school board passed a resolution of support for LGBTQ+ youth so that there could be no misunderstanding about the school board’s intention of nurturing an open, inclusive environment in line with the school district’s values and goals.

I was proud of the school board’s initiative, and I was incredibly proud to see ACT raise the Pride flag at our national headquarters on June 11. Speaking to a long-time colleague at the flag raising event, we reflected that this kind of overt support had been a long time coming, and something neither of us were sure we’d ever see. But we did see it, and the flag is waving proudly!

We're celebrating #PrideMonth! We kicked off ACT Pride Week Monday morning with the raising of the Pride Flag at ACT Headquarters! pic.twitter.com/qZTt67s7kN

— ACT Careers (@ACTCareer) June 14, 2018

Even with these gains of support, I’m not naïve enough to believe that passing a resolution or flying a flag will, by themselves, yield lasting change. They are incredibly important steps, but acceptance can take time, persistence, self-examination, humility, and an openness to learning about and appreciating all of our differences. I am optimistic that ACT’s Pride Week events will help grow that awareness and understanding and forge a deeper appreciation for each of our individual stories.

Thank you to our panelists for an engaging discussion about "Being and/or Supporting LGBTQ+ in the Workplace" #PrideMonth #ACTCares pic.twitter.com/qfN3vkT8OS

— ACT Careers (@ACTCareer) June 15, 2018

I hope that all of you will take part in some of the opportunities that Pride Month brings in your communities. And for those in the Iowa City area, join me in the Iowa City Pride Parade this Saturday, June 16 to show your support for ACT team members and our community. It’s going to be a blast!

ACT is excited to support the Iowa City Pride Festival on Saturday for #PrideMonth! We will join @IC_Pride in celebrating inclusion and community!#ACTCares #Pride #Pride2018

— ACT Careers (@ACTCareer) June 15, 2018

The two organizations worked together to conduct research establishing the new concordance tables, the first since the SAT was redesigned in 2016

New York, NY & Iowa City, IA—ACT and the College Board today are releasing new concordance tables that allow users to compare scores from the new SAT test (redesigned in 2016) and the ACT test. The 2018 ACT/SAT concordance tables, derived from a joint comprehensive research study conducted by the two organizations over the past nine months, are based on scores of nearly 600,000 graduating seniors in the class of 2017 who took both tests.

ACT and the College Board, with engagement from the NCAA technical committee, periodically produce concordance tables to assist in comparing scores of students who may complete different tests. The ACT and the SAT measure similar but not identical content and skills, and they employ different score scales. The ACT Composite score is based on a scale of 1 to 36, while the SAT Total score ranges from 400 to 1600. Both the ACT and SAT are accepted at all colleges and universities in the US.

The concordance tables are designed to be used by colleges, K12 education professionals, scholarship organizations, students, policymakers and others to inform policies, processes and decisions. They may be used to compare SAT and ACT scores across different students, to establish policies using comparable scores from both tests and to convert scores for use in a predictive model or index. Both ACT and the College Board have consistently advised that test scores should be used in combination with other factors—including grades—in making important decisions such as admissions.

The 2018 ACT/SAT concordance tables are now the only official concordance tables between the ACT and the SAT and should be used as the single source of reference moving forward when comparing scores on the two tests. These tables replace the concordance tables that were released in 2016.

The new concordance tables may be accessed for free on both the ACT (www.act.org/concordance) and the SAT (www.collegeboard.org/concordance) websites.

Contact:

ACT
Ed Colby
ed.colby@act.org
319-337-1147

College Board
Abby Jacobs
communications@collegeboard.org
212-649-5414

About ACT

ACT is a mission-driven, nonprofit organization dedicated to helping people achieve education and workplace success. Headquartered in Iowa City, Iowa, ACT is trusted as a national leader in college and career readiness, providing high-quality assessments grounded in nearly 60 years of research. ACT offers a uniquely integrated set of solutions designed to provide personalized insights that help individuals succeed from elementary school through career. To learn more about ACT, visit us online at www.act.org.

About the College Board

The College Board is a mission-driven not-for-profit organization that connects students to college success and opportunity. Founded in 1900, the College Board was created to expand access to higher education. Today, the membership association is made up of over 6,000 of the world’s leading educational institutions and is dedicated to promoting excellence and equity in education. Each year, the College Board helps more than seven million students prepare for a successful transition to college through programs and services in college readiness and college success — including the SAT® and the Advanced Placement Program®. The organization also serves the education community through research and advocacy on behalf of students, educators, and schools. For further information, visit www.collegeboard.org.

For too many people, college admissions—and all the trauma and drama that can come with it—has become a zero-sum game.

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I was helping my 15-year-old son register for his sophomore classes the other day. That’s when my role as parent serendipitously intersected with my “day job” as a workforce policy researcher. He attends a fairly forward-thinking public school that offers students a wide variety of courses and extra-curricular activities. Since my son is a high-achieving student, he and I were invited to visit a local career technical college that coordinates with our school district to offer applied STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) career programs for qualified students.

At the end of the visit, I contacted the school counselor about a question that needled me during the entire visit: in order to continue to meet college preparatory requirements, my son needed to choose between either taking exciting applied math and science courses at the local career technical college or participating in extra-curricular activities, while staying in his regular high school. As a mom, I want the best for my child and for him to have a “normal” social life full of extra-curricular activities.

Why should a student have to give up normal and valuable high school activities to be both college ready and career ready? Shouldn’t the high school curriculum prepare them for both?

It does not need to be this way.

In the well-intentioned effort to provide our children with the best academic knowledge to prepare them for postsecondary education and a meaningful career, we have separated the teaching of how to apply that knowledge to solving real world problems.

Why do we separate college preparatory coursework from the applied teaching that occurs in career technical education programs? Why does this occur in both secondary and postsecondary education programs? Why do we make our students and parents choose between college and career readiness pathways at an early age – as if one was completely separate from the other?

Over the past two years, my work, along with my colleague and co-author Krista Mattern, has attempted to reconcile the similarities and nuances in college and career readiness.

We believe that stories similar to my son’s are playing out all over our nation’s schools. And that’s a shame. We believe it is important to ensure that all students are learning the skills they will need to succeed in whatever path they take after high school graduation, and that no student should have to choose between being college ready and being career ready.

Our insights and recommendations are summarized in the report entitled, Ready for What? Development of a Hierarchical Framework Linking College Readiness and Career Readiness, which can be accessed for free on the ACT website.

We look forward to continuing a robust debate regarding the best path we can offer our children for readiness to achieve both college and career success.

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‘Beating the Odds’ by Roadtrip Nation follows the journey of three students who have overcome challenges to make it to college as they meet successful professionals, including former First Lady Michelle Obama, who share their own stories of growth through adversity

Costa Mesa, Calif., June 4, 2018 – Beginning June 3, a new one-hour documentary special, “Beating the Odds,” will be streaming at beatingtheoddsfilm.com and air nationally on public television. Produced by career exploration nonprofit Roadtrip Nation, and presented by KQED, “Beating the Odds” follows three college students as they explore careers through a series of interviews with remarkable professionals who have overcome life challenges to succeed in their fields. The college students are overcoming obstacles of their own, including opioid-addicted parents, navigating the foster care system, and surviving poverty.

Supported by ACT’s Center for Equity in Learning, with advisory support from the Better Make Room campaign, “Beating the Odds” explores the ways in which people overcome tough circumstances, make it to and through college, and gain resilience through hardship. The film follows James “Ikie,” Estephanie, and Esther as they travel from Long Island to Los Angeles in Roadtrip Nation’s green RV.

The film features actors, politicians, athletes, and educators, all of whom are now dedicated to improving pathways to make the world a better place for those who need it most. The roadtrippers cross paths with former First Lady Michelle Obama; author and foster care advocate Ashley Rhodes-Courter; the first openly gay mayor of Long Beach, California, Robert Garcia; actress and producer Elaine Del Valle; and Paralympian track star Scout Bassett, as well as other inspiring individuals.

“Roadtrip Nation is about giving people opportunities to explore their potential and find a path through life that is meaningful and impactful,” said Mike Marriner, co-founder of Roadtrip Nation. “That’s why we were pleased to have ACT’s Center for Equity in Learning fuel this initiative, with advisory support from Better Make Room. Everyone has their unique road, but some people have been dealt an especially challenging hand. We wanted to show the world that your circumstances don’t define you and that adversity can actually become a motivator rather than a barrier, as the roadtrippers in this documentary demonstrate through their curiosity, courage, and strength.”

“Beating the Odds” roadtripper “Ikie” hails from West Virginia coal country, where his father became a casualty of the opioid crisis and where he attends college. He is studying political science in hopes of alleviating the problems facing his community. Esther grew up struggling with depression and anxiety as she made her way through the foster care system. She was adopted into a loving family and doesn’t want to let her past limit her as she studies theater and elementary education. Estephanie was raised by a single mother in the Bronx, where financial hardship was an ever-present reality. She is dedicated to turning her love of dramatic performance into a viable, fulfilling career. Ultimately, these three young people hope that sharing their stories can inspire other students who are facing similar obstacles.

“Every life involves twists and turns, and a key skill is being able to navigate through the successes and the setbacks — even when the odds seem stacked against you,” said ACT CEO Marten Roorda. “The roadtrippers, through their individual journeys, bring to life our mission of helping people find the education and workplace success they are seeking in their lives.” 

“Better Make Room is a campaign that gives young people the space and the tools they need to create their own movement to complete higher education,” said Eric Waldo, executive director of Reach Higher, the initiative that oversees the Better Make Room campaign. “We were excited to help Roadtrip Nation share stories of beating the odds and overcoming great challenges with ‘Ikie,’ Esther, and Estephanie. We know that the more we share stories of grit and perseverance, the more young people will see reflections of themselves and feel empowered to complete their education and own their futures.”

To learn more and watch “Beating the Odds,” visit beatingtheoddsfilm.com and follow @RoadtripNation, @ACTEquity, @BetterMakeRoom and the hashtag #BTORoadtrip on Twitter.

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