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The College Compact

Governors are cutting deals with college-bound students — before they're even out of middle school.

By ALAN GREENBLATT

Jim Doyle has been traveling around Wisconsin cutting deals with 12-year-olds. The reason for the governor's interest in the tween set is educational performance. Like a lot of other state officials, Doyle wants the kids in his state to do a better job of getting themselves ready for college, so he has been signing a "covenant" with them, promising a boost in college financial aid if they take tough courses in high school and do reasonably well in them.

High school, long neglected as states concentrated their attention on accountability testing in elementary and middle schools, has become an area of real concern. Aside from the National Governors Association's effort to shame states into coming clean about their abysmal high school graduation rates, high school has become a focus for policy makers who want it to be a sturdy bridge toward a successful college career.

A number of states, including Indiana, Texas and Michigan, have made their core high school curricula more rigorous. In some cases, successful completion of a college prep courseload is now a requirement for entry into state universities. It no longer makes sense, if it ever did, to allow 12th grade to be a wasteful way station when students could be taking advanced courses and earning credit both toward graduation and toward a college degree.

Doyle is not alone in taking a "you do your part, we'll do ours" approach to financing higher ed. Many students come from backgrounds in which they assume college just isn't for them. States want them to know that if they make the right decisions, they won't have to worry much about finances. Several states are borrowing the idea, pioneered by Indiana, that promises students more financial aid if they do well taking a set high school courseload. "The program provides strong guarantees that they'll have financial aid if they prepare properly," says Paul Lingenfelter, president of SHEEO (State Higher Education Executive Officers).

Of course, in reality there are no guarantees. Financial promises made to this year's 8th graders will have to be kept by legislators who haven't even been elected yet. Doyle was roundly criticized in Wisconsin for signing up far more young people than his budget would provide scholarship money for, even as the covenant idea is just getting underway.

There are concerns in other states that these sorts of programs will create more student demand than colleges can accommodate. But that would be a good problem for states to have.

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