By Peyton Cleaver, Managing Editor
“Unlimited You” is a phrase that has been drilled into the minds of Kennedy students over the past two years. Yet, despite its inspirational tagline, the AUHSD Pledge fails to provide a significant advantage to students going into higher education.
Although the AUHSD Pledge helps to provide some opportunities for students, the lack of information surrounding the Pledge ultimately renders it useless. This creates just another confusing and vague part to the college admissions process.
The language in the Pledge is often unclear and reads more like legislation than a document meant to help high schoolers apply to college. It isn’t accessible to the very people it attempts to reach.
“I think that students need to be savvy in terms of what it’s offering. Sometimes when we discuss various programs we hear what we want to hear…,” English teacher Kimberly Weir said. “It’s just read the fine print and know that there are certain majors, such as nursing… the Pledge isn't always going to apply.”
Despite CSUF being a partner in the Pledge, there are no benefits for AUHSD students enrolling in CSUF as the Pledge only applies to non-impacted majors. This means that the Pledge doesn’t apply to any of the majors at CSUF or the most popular programs at UCI.
In addition to the confusing language used in the Pledge, the lack of information on the Pledge prevents students from making effective decisions concerning their education. In order for the Pledge to be truly useful, students need to be aware of what it actually offers.
“You can’t take a semester off and then be a Pledge student; you have to go right into it. You can’t do a gap year or anything like that,” Kennedy alumni Georgina Bell said. “My friend, Duke, he’s in the army and he wasn’t able to go to the first semester because he was still in basic training until October… They said he didn’t qualify for the Pledge program because he wasn’t technically graduating from AUHSD.”
The lack of information on the Pledge prevents students from using it to plan their college route. Students fall through the cracks because of the lack of advisement. The hidden requirements and stipulations prevent students from utilizing the Pledge as a tool in the college admissions process.
The goals of the Pledge are noble: making college more accessible, creating career ready kids, building a more educated and well-rounded community. In execution however, the Pledge falls short.
“Our mission is to serve all the people of this great state by offering the finest education to its top students, regardless of circumstance,” UCI Chancellor Howard Gillman said at the signing of the Pledge.
If the Pledge truly aims to help serve the people as Gillman claims, then its creators should be working to inform students on what the Pledge means. Without giving clear information, the Pledge only serves as an empty promise of higher education to students. This lack of follow through ends up harming students rather than helping them as they plan their education around benefits the Pledge promises.
While the Pledge is far from perfect, it is a start towards accessible higher education. Before the Pledge can be a truly useful tool for AUHSD students, the way it’s presented to students must be reformed. Until the Pledge is made to be transparent and easily understood by students, it will not be able to help students in the way it promises.
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