Newark

Newark, NJ, May 7, 2014 – For the past several months, high school students from across the Newark Public Schools District have been spending their afternoons advising the superintendent and senior officials on college and career readiness strategies that can be implemented in Newark’s high schools.

11 a.m. – 1 p.m. at Rutgers University, Paul Robeson Center, 350 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard, Newark, NJ 07102.  The session will focus on financial literacy, helping students understand how to pay for college and supporting high school seniors with last minute financial aid and scholarship applications.  In addition there will be a Career Fair with 50 local professionals and workshops on medical sciences, hospitality and tourism and law.

Another component of the initiative is the launch of #ACT4Newark. Students from the Rutgers Abbott Leadership Institute’s Youth Media Symposium have created a student-led social media campaign to raise awareness about the ACT, as a critical step in the college-going process that helps students get test-ready as early as the 8th grade. #ACT4Newark is now live, with daily tips posted to Facebook and Twitter and a newly released, student-produced public service announcement, starring the ACT Wizard: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8LqraPRIdA#t=37

Students are also helping the district develop a college-and-career-knowledge course that will be taught in all Newark high schools in the fall. The course will start in the 9th grade with skill-building lessons on the basics of goal setting, time management and organization. Students will use those skills as they tackle post-secondary planning and career exploration in 10th and 11th grade, with a focus on the college-going process in the 12th grade. Currently, students are surveying Newark Public Schools graduates on how prepared they felt for their own experiences at college and starting out in their careers, in order to identify challenges and tips for success to pass along to NPS students.