A lot of things are on the mind of admissions director LuAnn Smith these days, but perhaps none is more pressing than the recruitment of minorities to the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy.
Of 230 letters of acceptance recently mailed to students announcing that they have been admitted into the academy for next fall, just 18–or about 8 percent–of the invitations went to African-Americans.
In an effort to beef up recruiting efforts at the academy, Smith wants to hire a consultant to evaluate the school’s recruitment policies and offer suggestions on how to increase awareness of the school. The goal is to increase the number of applicants, particularly minorities.
“We’re looking for anybody who can help find a way to reach those kids,” she said. “We send out tons of information … but there are still pockets of people who don’t know about us.”
More Top Picks Best Smart Plug
The three-year, state-run high school is required to reflect the state’s racial and geographic demographics in its enrollment. The school has received criticism in recent months by state minority leaders who have alleged that it is failing meet that mandate.
African-Americans, for example, make up about 15 percent of the state’s population, compared with the 8 percent of the newly invited sophomore class.
Asians, on the other hand, make up little more than 3 percent of the state population, but they make up 32 percent of those invited for the incoming class.
Latino students represent 9 percent of the population but only 3 percent of those invited. Caucasians, who make up 72 percent of the state’s population, received 53 percent of the acceptance letters.
School officials maintain that while there is room for improvement at the Aurora-based boarding school, the school does better than similar schools across the country.
In Louisiana, for example, 32 percent of the state is African-American; that state’s math and science academy is made up of 10 percent blacks.
“If you look at the schools like us nationwide, we are doing better than any of them,” Smith said.
School administrators say they can’t admit students who don’t apply, and they have tried numerous tactics to raise awareness of the school in minority communities.
“It is a large concern of ours,” said Luis Nunez, a member of the school’s board of trustees and a chemist at Argonne National Laboratory. “We’re not letting go of that and are looking at root causes. But it’s a slow process.”
Part of the problem, he said, is that “we don’t get the numbers applying.”
Over the nearly 15 years since its founding, administrators at IMSA have tried a number of recruitment tactics.
They’ve visited middle schools, held seminars and offered special tours. They try to raise awareness by working through alumni and community leaders.
Last winter, they sent 1,700 letters to churches in predominantly minority communities inviting pastors to a special open house. The idea was to get in touch with stellar minority applicants through their churches and synagogues.
Officials had high hopes for the program, but a special open house for pastors attracted just one visitor, a response rate that shocked school officials.
“We did something wrong, but we’re not sure what it was and we’ll keep trying,” Smith said.
Compounding the problem, officials said, is the difficulty of getting students to come to a boarding school in the first place.
No matter how bright or eager a student is, many simply do not want to attend school away from home. In addition, parents may not want their child to be enrolled in a boarding school.
And, Smith said, students’ home schools are not always eager to have their stellar talent leave for other academic pastures.
“The kids that come here are terrific; they are exciting and vibrant,” she said. “They tend to be the leaders, the presidents of student councils, the movers and shakers in their home schools. And we’re not always perceived real well [by other schools] who see [enrollment at the academy] as a loss.”
Further, the admissions requirements are quite stiff.
The students must have high grades and good test scores, be involved in a host of extracurricular activities and have good letters of recommendation.
Perhaps the toughest standard, however, requires a full year of beginning algebra and a full year of a laboratory science before students are admitted.
Those two requirements alone have eliminated many good applicants, officials said.
It especially hurts 8th graders who had hoped to be accepted as sophomores at the academy and skip the 9th grade.
More Top Picks Best Eero Mesh Systems
Many of those students are invited to intensive summer workshops in an effort to give them an academic boost, with the hopes that they reapply next year.
“I do know of a number of really good kids who we hope we don’t lose,” Smith said. “The problem is that those kids might go to another high school and get attached there and won’t want to leave and go through the whole application process a year later.”
For graduating senior Donielle Newell, the student representative on the school’s board of trustees, making sure minorities succeed once they are at the school is just as important as getting them there.
“It’s not just recruitment, but retention and support,” said Newell, an African-American from Downers Grove who is headed for Stanford University in the fall.
It’s a tough program, she said, and “we want to make sure that they graduate.”