Schools designed to serve students who have dropped out or are at risk of dropping out
The HISD Board of Education will consider a proposal Thursday to create a partnership with Houston Community College to open two Middle College High Schools focused on serving students who are in danger of dropping out of school or who have already dropped out.
At first glance it may look like a typical classroom at Scarborough High School, but at the head of the class is a college professor. “I tell them that when they enter this room it is not Scarborough High School but Houston Community College,” said HCC Professor Suni Diaz.
Diaz and other professors from HCC are teaching HISD students this summer as part of the Houston Innovative Learning Zone (HILZ) academies that opened this month at Scarborough and five other campuses, including the Long School, Furr, Kashmere, Sterling, and Booker T. Washington high schools. The new academies offer students career training as well as the opportunity to earn career certifications and a college associate’s degree.
“It has all the benefits of college and it’s free,” said James Jackson, who is taking his first college class this summer as part of Scarborough’s HILZ Academy for Network and Computer Administration. “It was an amazing opportunity that I couldn’t pass up.”