Leave No Schools Behind: The Importance of a College Culture in Urban Public High Schools

Creating a college culture that is available to all K-12 public school students helps prepare individuals for postsecondary academic and career endeavors. Establishing and maintaining a college culture requires structural and organizational arrangements that facilitate students' access to critical human and material resources. These arrangements should create frequent opportunities for students to access school-based social support networks that help them identify necessary academic coursework and appropriately plan for higher education. This study provides a conceptual framework for college culture and uses districtwide data to empirically examine the relationship between school size and high school seniors' self-reports of their involvement with the college culture in urban public high schools. ********** Long gone are the days when a high school diploma ensured job security and economic self-sufficiency for one's self and family. Although there are several prosperous postsecondary paths one could pursue (e.g. technical and vocational training, apprenticeships, military experience), the purpose of this article is to consider the preparation for enrolling in, and graduating from, four-year colleges and universities. Couturier and Cunningham (2006) state that individuals with bachelor's degrees are more likely than those without college degrees to have higher wages, more employment benefits, better working conditions, more personal and professional opportunities, and an overall improved quality of life. From a societal standpoint, individuals with college degrees are more likely to contribute to the nation's workforce, pay taxes, and engage in more social, civic and charitable activities (Couturier and Cunningham, 2006). According to the United States Department of Education (2006), close to 70 percent of all twelfth graders expected to go on to earn a four-year degree or graduate degree and these aspirations were consistent across gender, race, ethnicity, and class. Yet, many African American and Latino students and students from low socioeconomic backgrounds continue to be underprepared for, and underrepresented in, four-year colleges and universities (McDonough, 2004; National Center for Education Statistics, 2008). While it is important to identify and address the influence of individual characteristics on students' educational aspirations and achievement (see Adelman, 2006; Hossler, Schmidt, & Vesper, 1999; Schneider & Stevenson, 1999), it would be remiss not to also consider the influences of the organizational and structural conditions of the schools they attend. This is especially important for populations that have not been consistently advocated for in postsecondary education because many students from these groups have been found to heavily, if not exclusively, rely upon their high schools to help prepare them for college (Adelman, 2006; McDonough, 2004; Venezia & Kirst, 2005; Wimberly, 2002). Underrepresented students generally rely on their secondary schools for college preparation and guidance because they often have parents who have not completed college and they frequently live in communities where neighboring adults have not completed college (Choy, Horn, Nunez, & Chen, 2000; Farmer-Hinton, 2008; O'Connor, 2000; Sander, 2006). Without the ability to access resources and guidance from their personal and community networks, students tend to rely upon their school networks to access social capital for college planning and guidance (Ceja, 2000; Gonzalez, Stone & Jovel, 2003; Noeth & Wimberly, 2002; O'Connor, 2000). Yet, research has found that the schools that these students attend have several organizational and structural conditions that adversely influence students' educational aspirations and achievement (Corwin, Venegas, Oliverez & Colyar, 2004; Freeman, 1997; Gonzalez, Stone & Jovel, 2003; Holland, 2008; McDonough, 2004). Some of the most notable variations are related to the size and location of the school, the course offerings and academic tracks, and the race, ethnicity and socioeconomic status of the students enrolled (Roscigno, Tomaskovic-Devey, & Crowley, 2006; Venezia & Kirst, 2005). …