Only one in two graduates from Alexandria City Public Schools enrolled in college — including community college — according to a new report from Virginia officials.
Officials at T.C. Williams High School say they’re disappointed and trying to do better, while parents describe a high school divided in two, with the “haves” who go on to college and the “have-nots” who won’t.
The first-time report from the Virginia Department of Education found that 55 percent of Alexandria students enroll in college within 16 months of graduation.
Statewide, 62 percent of all Virginia high school students go to college, with many rural areas falling below that mark, Education Department spokesman Charles Pyle.
In rural Bath County, 49 percent of graduates went to college. Elsewhere in the Washington area, 74 percent of Fairfax County graduates enrolled in college, as did 68 percent in Arlington County.
In Alexandria, a quarter of T.C. Williams graduates enrolled in four-year public universities and 9 percent enrolled in four-year private institutions, while 22 percent signed up for two-year programs.
“I’m disappointed to see it at 55 percent,” said Greg Forbes, counseling director at T.C. Williams, the 12,357-student district’s only high school. “It must go up. We must do better.”
This year’s seniors are the first to have Individualized Achievement Plans, or IAPs, personalized goals developed by a student’s counselor and instructors. School officials hope this and the additional counselors they’ve hired will boost students’ interest in college and awareness of available financial assistance.
Parents agreed the college rate seemed low, but didn’t have reservations about sending their children to T.C. Williams. Linda Kelly, the district’s PTA president and a Cora Kelly Elementary parent, said that school officials recognize a split at T.C. Williams between children from low-income families and those with more affluent, college-educated parents.
“If you’re an involved parent with lots of economic advantages, your kid can do well at T.C. Williams,” said Kelly, who plans to send her children there. “Other families struggle. I think ACPS is doing a lot to support those families, but there are a lot of challenges.”
Perhaps the most diverse district in the Washington area, Alexandria has a student body that is 34 percent black and 30 percent Hispanic. More than half of its students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a typical measure of poverty.
Of the economically disadvantaged students who graduated last spring, 45 percent enrolled in a two- or four-year college.
“It’s not like there are two distinct groups, but there is a spectrum: There are kids who aren’t very motivated, who might sleep on the couch with the TV is on because they don’t have their own bed, or a place to do homework, or don’t have dinner,” said Priscilla Goodwin, a parent of a T.C. Williams 10th-grader and two graduates who went on to college. “They need more parental involvement.”
