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Granger High School in Washington State has garnered national attention for its remarkable journey from bad to great. Most Granger students come from low-income families working on farms in the surrounding Yakima Valley. Many are children of migrant workers. In 2001, Granger was plagued by gang violence, low morale and an astronomical dropout rate. Now more than 95% of Granger students graduate, and almost 90% go on to college or technical school. (See our story about Granger here.)

Granger principal Paul Chartrand recently spoke with me about the critical work of sustaining the trend. The overriding message I took away from our conversation: Forge strong personal connections with students and their families.

Sustaining the Turnaround Trend

Public School Insights: Granger High School has been described by quite a few people as a real turnaround story. Do you think that is a fair description?

Chartrand: I do think it’s a fair description. My predecessor, Richard Esparza, really started the turnaround. I took over last year, and we are trying to continue the trend. We have been successful in a couple of areas, and we are still working on it in a couple of more.

Public School Insights: What kind of a school was Granger before the turnaround, in about 2001?

Chartrand: Before the turnaround, there was a very high dropout rate—I think the graduation rate was only around 50 to 60%. [There was] a very high crime rate, and a lot of kids not being successful, not meeting state standards on the tests. And [there was] a lot of apathy when it came to school in general. So it was a very tough community to live in.

Personal Connection to Students

Public School Insights: What do you think were some of the biggest changes that had to happen quickly to transform the kind of school Granger was?

Chartrand: I think one of the biggest changes was starting the advisory program, where every student had a voice and had an adult who looked after them.

The adults showed they cared about each of the students at the school. So the students always knew they had somebody they could go to, somebody they could trust. Somebody who would see and greet them every day, just with a friendly hello. [They knew] their education and their well-being was a priority for that staff member.

Public School Insights: So a great deal of personalization in the school.

Chartrand: That’s right.

Public School Insights: I have also heard about the early attempts to deal with behavior and discipline problems. Is that something you have heard about in your own experiences at the school?

Chartrand: There was an early attempt to stem those behavior issues. The students who were serious about education stuck around. The students who were not serious about it found out that education was a priority here. A lot of them went and got their GEDs and focused elsewhere. They learned that education was the priority here, and that if you are coming here, this is what you are going to do. You are going to do school.

The Case for Extended Graduation Rates

Public School Insights: But it seems now that you have a very, very impressive graduation rate, given the kinds of challenges that a lot of your students come to school with.

Chartrand: Yes, our extended graduation rate last year was 96%. Going from the mid-fifties to 96% over the course of ten years is, I think, absolutely amazing. Predicting what our numbers are going to be this year—I think they are going to be 98 or 99% for our extended graduation rate.

I think the personalization is the key. Each of those students knows that they are going to be held accountable. When they stop showing up and that kind of thing, the advisors call home or the advisors even go to their homes and find out what’s going on and how we can help.

Public School Insights: You mentioned that this is an extended graduation rate. Do you think that extended graduation rate is an important thing to take into account?

Chartrand: I think the extended graduation rate is a very important thing to take into account. With the high migrant numbers that we have, students are moving from place to place. A lot of students will go to Mexico for three or four months out of the year, during the school year. Giving them the extra time to take the classes that they need to graduate and get that diploma is a huge, huge factor.

They know we are not leaving them out because their parents choose to move from place to place or go to Mexico for three or four months. They are still able to do their work and maybe graduate a little later, but they are still getting their diplomas.

Doing Whatever It Takes to Connect with Parents

Public School Insights: You mentioned parents. One of the things that has been written about Granger is its success in making connections to parents. Is that still a big priority?

Chartrand: I think this is going to be year [six] that we have 100% of parents at our parent conferences in both the fall and the spring.

We’ve had a parent here for each student for the last nine or ten years, and it has been extremely successful. The parents know they are expected to come here. They are being involved in their students’ education, and they are very interested in what their students are doing at school.

Public School Insights: That really comes in contrast to what you often hear about schools that serve mostly parents who are living in poverty or who have other kinds of pressures they are dealing with. How do you do it?

Chartrand: It’s the staff. It’s not the administration doing it. It’s the staff understanding that parents play a vital role in their students’ education. They do whatever it takes to make sure we [connect with] those parents. Whether it’s calling the parents in and the parents coming in for their conferences. Whether it’s staying until eight or nine o’clock when a parent gets off work, whether it’s coming in at five or six o’clock before a parent goes to work. I have even had a couple of staff members go to a parent’s work, when the parent has only a thirty minute lunch break, to make sure that parent knows what is going on in their child’s education.

This is a fantastic staff. They know that not all students are the same. So we make sure we do whatever it takes to get those parents involved.

Academic Help for Struggling Students

Public School Insights: You mentioned there are very high expectations and that students understand they will be held to those them. Are there structures to help students who are really struggling to meet those expectations?

Chartrand: We have several structures in place. We have, which we just started this year, the Granger Enrichment Center, where students who need extra help with classwork or study skills are able to go during their day and get the extra help that they need.

We also have a 21st Century program, which is an after-school program that had, I think, about 45 students regularly attend last year. [It is offered] four days a week. [Students] are given food and rides home if they need them.

We have a Gear Up [Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs] program, which gets students involved as freshmen in understanding what college life is like, how to go about getting into college and the different things they can do [to prepare for it].

We have, again, our dedicated staff that is willing to do the extra to get those students the help they need, whatever that help may be.

Getting Students on the College Track

Public School Insights: You mentioned the Gear Up program and college. You have a very high graduation rate. Have you been able to make strides, especially since the late ‘90s, in getting students on to college?

Chartrand: We just went over our numbers. I can’t remember the exact numbers, but I think 88% of our seniors went on to postsecondary education, whether that is a two-year, a four-year, a trade school, a technical school. I think 5% went into the workplace and 3% went into the military, but the rest went on to postsecondary education.

Transforming a School; Transforming a Community

Public School Insights: To get back to the community very briefly…Granger is obviously not a wealthy town, but I have heard the school has had a real impact on the community’s well-being. Do you think that is the case?

Chartrand: I think it has a big impact. I think with education being a priority and the fact that our students are seen doing better…Not only academically, but you bring pride to the town by their sports teams doing well, and you bring pride to the town by looking at state scores.

As [Granger’s] state scores go up, other students [want to attend]. I have a stack on my desk of other students wanting to get into Granger High School from other school districts. So you see that, and how important that is, and it brings a big pride to the community.

The crime rate has gone down as you see the scores go up and the students succeed.

Its just an amazing, amazing transformation to see.

“Challenges Are What We Make of Them”

Public School Insights: You also mentioned, however, that there are challenges. I imagine that when you’ve turned around a school that is in a challenging environment there could be difficulties in sustaining the momentum. Do you find that is true, or that the challenges can’t be handled with the same ferocity and focus that you applied earlier?

Chartrand: I think challenges are what we make of them. We face them head on, and we do whatever it takes to make sure those students are successful and will succeed.

I think as the second year principal here, [I] see what Richard did, and he did wonderful, great things for this school and this community. I had the pleasure of working with him for a year before he retired. I wanted to make sure that we kept those things going, and I think that we’re doing a great job.