Email This StoryEditorial: Community should work to raise Waco education rate
Oct. 2, 2009According to the latest American Community Survey from the U.S. Census Bureau, nearly 25 percent of adults in Waco did not graduate from high school.
"In spite of MCC and TSTC and Baylor all being here, the level of education that local residents achieve is even low by Texas standards, and Texas is lower than the rest of the nation," Dr. Larry Lyon, director of the Center for Community Research and Development, told The Lariat for a story published Sept. 23.
Large cities such as Seattle, San Francisco and Washington, D.C., on the other hand, have some of the highest education rates in the nation. One explanation for this may be accessibility to educational materials and institutions. However, with Waco's obvious access to several educational institutions, one has to wonder why its education rate is so low.
Sure, Waco may not have all the resources of these big cities, but it does have one significant resource - Baylor University. And we, as a university, need to do our part to improve Waco's low education rate.
The lack of adult education in Waco is not simply reflective of high school dropouts, but also of Central Texas's ability to retain college graduates, as The Lariat has reported. McLennan Community College and Texas State Technical College are great community colleges, but perhaps people do not realize that. In fact, 86 percent of students say they would recommend MCC to others, compared to the 77 percent national average, according to the MCC Web site. In addition, TSTC offers more than 100 technical associate degree and certificate programs and students spend about 60 percent of their time in laboratories, where they learn via hands-on practice, according to the TSTC Web site.
While The Lariat understands the importance of educating children, we believe it has been covered in many outlets, even most recently in Emily Saultz's column that ran in Wednesday's paper.
Educating adults in Waco - so that they might also inspire their families to become educated - should be an important goal of the community. When adults go back to school, they not only have the chance to learn in the conventional classroom sense, but they also have the opportunity to enrich their lives and further their goals. Education, for many, is a means of self-improvement, a method of cultivating interests and a way to use and improve talents. It is certainly a vital part of our society's future well-being, and on a personal level, has the potential to add purpose to human life.
There are many ways to get involved with adult education in Waco, many created by Baylor through various partnerships.
One of those options includes the Learning English Among Friends (LEAF) program.
Baylor, especially through the School of Social Work and the School of Education, developed and continues to operate LEAF. The program is located at Cesar Chavez Middle School and helps to teach English as a second language.
GEAR UP Waco (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs), created through a collaboration of Baylor, TSTC, Waco ISD and two nonprofits, is aimed at increasing the number of low-income students and helping prepare them for post-secondary education.
The Center for Astrophysics, Space Physics, and Engineering Research (CASPER) is a Baylor Center with an experimental facility built around a partnership between Baylor and TSTC.
CASPER's Summer High School Scholars Program (sponsored by Baylor, TSTC and CASPER) provides AP high school students with opportunities for interdisciplinary, hands-on training through coursework in computer interfacing, computer diagnostics, vacuum systems and electro-optics components.
Students have the opportunity to participate in all of these programs and further information concerning them can be found at either of the programs' Web sites.
We challenge the student body to look at the shortcomings of our local community and become part of the solution through practical efforts.
It is never too late for adults to go back to school. Though added responsibilities often exist for adults, it is up to all of us to make positive contributions to the community.
Though we, at The Lariat, certainly do not have everything figured out, we do want to encourage students to use the university's resources to help solve the education void in Waco. As students, we are given a chance to learn and grow. By humbly emerging ourselves into the needs of our city, through LEAF, GEAR UP and CASPER, we can help give others a chance to do the same.
The university has a significant place within the community. We should work to change the perception that we exist separately from the people of the community and begin working together for the common good. The hope would be that we could learn from each other and fight to improve Waco's low education rate.
We may not all be from Waco, but we do live here for four years or longer, and so we should share in the responsibility to help educate the children and even adults who live here.
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