Williston High School teacher Luanna Fisketjon presented some information about the program during a district Curriculum Committee meeting earlier this week.
"When I was hired last year, we were concerned about the dropout rate, and we started looking at some different solutions to help us," Fisketjon said during the curriculum meeting.
They explored the options of the JAG program, which is specifically tailored to students who "slip through the cracks."
"It's not really for kids at high risk...We've got students that are doing well, and we've got students that are very poor. But there's those kids that slip through the cracks, and JAG is a great program to try and bring them up to speed. There's a lot of hours involved in it, a lot of paperwork." This year marks the 25th anniversary of JAG and the program is used in 29 states. Students must have a certain number of "barriers," or risk factors, to qualify for the program.
"JAG shoots for a 94 percent graduation rate," said Fisketjon.
She said the graduation percentage sounds wonderful, but the program is not ideal for all struggling students.
A grant the district got for the program is sponsored in part by JAG. Fisketjon said the balance of the grant comes from the Workforce Investment Act.
"The governor gets a certain amount of money that he can use at his discretion, and he gave us a huge part of our $50,000 grant this year," she said.
She said the purpose is to have these kids feel like they are a part of something.
"I think a lot of kids that slip through the cracks are not in extracurricular organizations, they aren't necessarily in sports because of home lives or whatever their situation," she said.
Fisketjon said a career association is run during classroom hours, which is a bit extraordinary for a classroom setting. A parent dinner is coming up on Sept. 16-17, which is one example of an activity that students participate in as part of the class.
"My students picked the menu, they're doing the invitations, tomorrow we're going to Economart," she said. "They all have items to look for -- they need to figure out the budget and figure out how many servings we need, what the cost per serving would be. That's learning by doing. That's not me standing up in front of a board and telling them what to do."
She said student also are going to perform service projects.
"The more comfortable they get in front of people, the more opportunities it's going to provide for them," Fisketjon said. "If they get used to talking to Mr. Kittelson or Mike Kraft from Economart, they're going to feel better about going and talking to an employer. So thats part of JAG."
In addition to teaching her diversified occupation students, Fisketjon has 25 students involved in the JAG program.
"JAG will not let me put more than 45 (students) on the roster and right now I'm looking at it as a three-year program, is how i think it should work," she said.
Ideally, she wants to create a freshman-level, sophomore-junior level and a junior-senior level for JAG. She suggested asking JAG to condense the freshman and sophomore curriculum, since there is curriculum available for four years.
"Then I'll bring in more freshmen so that hopefully, I'll have a total of 45 students from the two classes. I'm going to fill it up as full as I can next year," she said.
She also is in the process of putting some numbers together.
"I'm trying to document time and document things so that at the end of the year, we can look at it and see if the value is there," she said.
Interim Superintendent Dr. Kent Hjelmstad feels the program is a positive addition for the district.
"We are the pilot, and I think that's pretty special to have you out on the cutting edge trying to help kids," he said. "Imagine if you even have 10 kids who would have dropped out and do not, I would like that."
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