This year, District 87 has launched a new initiative to help Juniors prepare for ACT exams in the spring. The program, called “Eight to Elevate,” originates from the Progress Learning corporation and makes use of mandatory online practice time to ensure that students are working towards a better score on their upcoming exam.
The process begins in October, when juniors take their first of three practice tests. After this diagnostic, each student receives a personal list of ACT standards to which they should dedicate most of their practice time. Juniors are required to spend at least eight hours on the platform improving their skills in these areas, and they can take two more practice exams to track their progress.
The advent of Progress Learning marks a significant shift from District 87’s previous methods of helping students prepare for junior-year exams. Mrs. Kush, the Assistant Principal of Instruction at Glenbard West and the main initiator of the Progress Learning program, explained that prep courses were a major component of the old system. Using externally hired teachers, the district would run classes after school that were meant to cover all topics that could appear on a college entrance exam.
Since prep courses had to address every topic on the ACT or SAT, students often had less instruction on topics they struggled with and spent most of their time on standards they already knew. According to Mrs. Kush, the courses were only run at a few specific times during the week, and many juniors leading busy high school lives were unable to attend classes on schedule. Even for those who could attend, prep courses were expensive, and they often took place right after school, adding an extra three hours of in-class studying to a long school day.
Given all these complications, Mrs. Kush said that prep courses saw attendance from just 20% of juniors. Some of the remaining 80% likely had private tutors, but there’s no way to know how many were completely unprepared.
The change to exam preparation came with changes in the exam itself— the Progress Learning program is calibrated to the new “Enhanced ACT,” which decreases the amount of reading, the testing time, and the number of options for multiple-choice math questions. Practice for this exam, which is now free and entirely online, can be completed whenever students have time. Progress Learning recommends a minimum of eight hours of practice to effectively prepare for the ACT, a suggestion that Glenbard schools enforce through the Eight to Elevate program.
Although the initiative is too new for District 87 to have any ACT score statistics, students have been recognizing the benefits this platform has to offer. Adler Wang, a junior at Glenbard West, cites the program’s ability to address “a wide selection of topics” while also pinpointing “what you need to improve on, down to the specific subject.” This personalized feedback stands in stark contrast to prep courses; students now receive practice questions and lessons that are tailor-made to their strengths and weaknesses.
With all that said, though, students and teachers also recognize the program’s drawbacks. Haley Michel, a junior at Glenbard West, said that Progress Learning does not “actually [explain] how to solve” the problems it gives for practice.
Mrs. Kush also addressed this key issue in her description of the platform: although it makes use of lesson videos, it does not indicate why student answers are correct or incorrect. Other online programs, such as Albert, offer detailed explanations behind correct and incorrect answers to practice questions.
Right now, District 87 is working to enforce this practice time as a graduation requirement for all juniors. Not all students are satisfied with this decision; both Mr. Wang and Ms. Michel mentioned that, after hiring a private tutor, the practice from Progress Learning seemed unnecessary and unproductive. Adler sums this attitude up by stating that Progress Learning “serves more as an annoyance than a learning opportunity.”
To help students incorporate practice time into their schedules, Mrs. Kush suggests making use of downtime during the school day. Students should recognize that periods like PLC and Collaboration Hour are not times when school isn’t in session; they are built-in study periods during the school week. Using this time for ACT preparation is worthwhile and makes the eight hours feel like less of a burden on a packed schedule.
Mrs. Kush also emphasizes the importance of studying with friends. Even if a student has a private tutor, practicing with peers can offer motivation and a trusted group of people to consult with issues.
District 87’s Eight to Elevate program is certainly a revolution in exam preparation, and it has elicited mixed feelings from students and teachers. This initiative has arrived with plenty of other changes to West’s long traditions— Glenbard Hour, block scheduling, and two new additions, to name a few— and will surely be met with the same conflict, discussion, and resolution that keeps Glenbard moving forward.
