With College in Sight, Roxbury Prep Launches Online Learning

For many Roxbury Prep High School students, the Spring is all about getting ready for the College Board’s Advanced Placement exams.

AP exams are often gatekeepers to the most selective colleges and hefty scholarships. So when public schools started shutting down nationally because of the coronavirus pandemic, educators at Roxbury Prep knew that their students had to keep on learning.

As news of possible school closings and stay at home possibilities mounted, Roxbury Prep knew that it must plan for teaching and learning to ensure its mission continued. The week before school went virtual, school leaders and teachers surveyed scholars about their wireless capabilities and the needs of their families, trained staff and students, and ensured that every scholar that had expressed need, left school for the weekend with access to a computer, to wi-fi, and had a plan to access food and technological support as the weeks continued.

Just as it has been its tradition and encapsulated in its mission, Roxbury Prep ensured that no level of socio-economic, racial, or neighborhood inequity in terms of resources, would impede on a scholar’s and families’ ability to access a college-bound education.

Then, Roxbury Prep announced that it would close on Friday, March 13. Four days later, on Tuesday, March 17, high school classes were already back in session in students’ kitchens, living rooms and bedrooms.

“We led through action, we were resilient, we built community and we embraced wonder,” said Titciana Barros, the principal of Roxbury Prep High School’s Upper School, and herself a graduate of the school and recently honored by the Celtics for being a Hero Among Us. “And as this pandemic continues to affect us as a community, we are modeling for our kids how to come together, how to care and take care and how to share commitment and love.”

Attendance has been high, and educators and students alike are learning to overcome technological challenges and teaching themselves and each other new tech skills. In addition to their AP classes, scholars are continuing to access their Arts and College Completion coursework to ensure fidelity to their high school course work.

Meanwhile, college acceptances continue to come into students’ email boxes. The Class of 2020 has already earned admission and full or hefty scholarships to Brown, Georgetown, Notre Dame, Swarthmore, Amherst, Colgate, Villanova, Carnegie Mellon and George Washington. In addition, Roxbury Prep students received 30 UMass Amherst admits and 14 Northeastern acceptances, among many other colleges and universities.

Families have expressed gratitude that their children can continue to work toward college.
“You all did awesome,” Laurie Reid, the mother of a 10th grader, told an administrator in a phone call. “The fact that unlike other high school students, he is not sitting at home during this time and is continuing to learn - thank you.”

For Roxbury Prep middle school students, their lessons are on a remote learning platform that includes video lessons as well as tasks for students to submit so that teachers can check for progress. Teachers are closely monitoring student work so that they can provide small group instruction via Zoom or phone calls. The remote learning platform is open to the public.

Over the course of the last 3 weeks, Roxbury Prep continues to do all it can to ensure students feel seen, heard, and known.

And as is tradition, this spring, Roxbury Prep will graduate the high school class of 2020, and begin its preparation to ensure that the class of 2021 continues to have strong and impactful college options as they begin their college application process later this year --- once again ensuring, as their mission states, that every scholar will enter, succeed in, and graduate from college.