With the help of the AmeriCorps VISTA program, the Sage All Stars (SAS) program is scheduled to begin in fall 2011, with the purposed of providing Troy middle and high school students an after school program whose curriculum and activities address literacy, wellness, and career education services for urban middle school students (n = 36 minimum).  Middle school is well known as the critical time in determining adolescents’ academic success or failure, and these years are particularly traumatic in schools serving students from high poverty communities where there are so many social pressures to under-perform. It is widely known that many urban districts have high school dropout rates approaching 50% of their student populations.

Designed to improve adolescents’ success in middle school, increase the likelihood that they will enter high school with the confidence, knowledge, and skills that they can succeed, and avoid of lifetimes of poverty, this program has several goals:  1) support urban students so that they are academically successful and can effectively negotiate the social pressures they will encounter in middle school; 2) improve urban students’ academic skills and sense of efficacy so that they enter high school with confidence in their ability to succeed; and, 3) broaden students’ visions of the future so that they view post-secondary education and/or training as viable choices in their own lives.

The program will be scheduled two days per week during the fall and spring semesters between the hours of 4:00 to 6:00 p.m.  Middle schools students will participate in after-school academics that integrate the new digital literacies; this program component will be provided by candidates in Sage’s Masters in Literacy Education (grades 5-12) program.  The middle school students will participate in programs about health and wellness, stress management, career planning, and individualized tutoring; teacher candidates completing required fieldwork in Sage’s graduate programs in Health Education, School Counseling, and Childhood and Secondary Education programs will support this program component.