Boston College, admittedly not technically in Boston and not technically a college, has a blossoming Let’s Get Ready program. We started out in the fall with 30 students and ended up with roughly 17 who came 75% of the time. Two of our main goals this semester were to increase the number of students and our attendance rate. We started this semester with 40 students, and after 4 weeks we still have 38 of them. We attribute this to our strong recruiting of students who want to be part of the program. We sent emails out to all 52 of the Boston Public Schools, and visited places such as the Oak Square YMCA and the Boys and Girls Club. Leading our 40 students we have seven math coaches and seven verbal coaches. Among the coaches, one verbal coach and two math coaches are returning.

At the beginning of the semester we implemented a new attendance policy to encourage students to come to class. This system keeps track of points that the students earn throughout the course of the program. Each student receives 3 points for showing up to class, 2 points for having 100% of their homework completed, 1 point for having 50% of their homework completed, and no points for missing class. All of the points each student earns goes towards his/her individual class. The class with the most points at the end of the semester earns a pizza and ice cream party on their last day. When we first introduced this system to the kids their eyes kinda glazed over and they didn’t seem too interested, but now that there is Poster Board, they’ve gotten more into it. Poster Board has a personality all the students love and they seem genuinely into the competition. We will have to wait and see how the rest of the semester shakes out, but so far it is looking good.