During the Clinton City Schools Board of Education called meeting Thursday, Instructional Services Coordinator Dr. Linda Jewell Carr gave an update on AVID implementation in each of the district’s five schools and how it is preparing students for success now and in the future.
AVID stands for Advancement Via Individual Determination and began in the city schools as an initiative in fifth and seventh grades during the 2023-24 school year. Now, it is a districtwide system beginning at L.C. Kerr with a schoolwide growth mindset and building to the high school level with a focus on organization, comprehension and vocabulary development, as well as college and career readiness.
The mission of AVID is to “close the opportunity gap by preparing all students for college and career readiness and success in a global society.”
At Thursday’s meeting, Carr provided the board with a handout summarizing each district school’s AVID implementation already in place and additional goals for this school year. She also gave principals present at the meeting a chance to share additional details about AVID at each of their schools.
Butler Avenue Principal Dr. Angela Harding-Newkirk emphasized that, in addition to the college presence and focus, students are learning academic critical thinking when engaging with material each day in the classroom.
When asked later about Sunset Avenue’s implementation of AVID, Principal Dr. Nicole Carroll shared that the school focuses on various elements of WICOR — Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Organization and Reading.
“We began our AVID journey at Sunset Avenue with the organization portion of WICOR — using agendas and binders and helping students learn to organize their materials in a way that will help them be ready to learn,” Carroll explained. “We then moved to the Reading portion of WICOR where we focus on varied reading strategies to build vocabulary and comprehension.”
Carroll added that the writing component of WICOR has been added this year.
“We are focusing on writing to learn so students are able to take notes such as two column notes which we are learning here at SAS and being able to write to respond and share their thinking. We use all of the elements of WICOR everyday at SAS but we wanted to chunk the pieces so our teachers and students could understand and implement AVID with intention so our students are able to move to the middle school and be College and Career Ready,” the principal concluded.
Anthony Peterson is teaching AVID at Clinton High, with last year being the first year it was implemented at the high school level. He shared in an interview that what stood out to him most was “seeing students begin to understand that success in school is not simply about being smart — it is also about having the right habits, strategies, mindset, and willingness to advocate for yourself.”
Through AVID, he was able to help students develop skills such as organization, focused note-taking, asking meaningful questions, collaboration, critical thinking, time management and goal setting.
“We also emphasized the importance of students taking ownership of their learning,” he stressed.
Peterson shared the importance of giving students the chance to interact with professionals in real-world careers through AVID so they could get a clearer picture of what it is like to actually work in those fields, as opposed to just reading about them online or in a textbook.
“I invited professionals from different career fields to speak with my students in person, share their experiences, answer questions, and exchange information with them. I wanted students to understand that there are real people behind the careers they may be interested in and that they can begin building relationships and learning from professionals while they are still in high school,” Peterson stressed.
One particularly meaningful visit was from Cruz Medina, a meteorologist with ABC11, Peterson shared.
“I had a student who was interested in becoming a meteorologist, so having someone who actually works in that field come into our classroom gave that student — and the rest of the class — the opportunity to ask questions and learn about what it is really like to work as a meteorologist.”
Brian Shrader from WRAL came to speak to the entire student body at CHS. Peterson stressed that experiences like these allowed students to hear directly from professionals about their “educational journeys, career experiences, challenges, and successes.”
The science teacher emphasized how much he appreciates the practicality of AVID strategies.
“Students were able to take what they learned in AVID and apply those strategies in their other classes. The WICOR framework — Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Organization, and Reading — gave students a structure for becoming more active and intentional learners.”
At the board meeting, Dr. Linda Brunson asked Carr about the students who had been in Peterson’s class last year and how they were continuing to develop those strategies.
Carr shared that the high school decided to make those students part of Peterson’s homeroom, giving him the chance to continue implementing AVID with them. When asked about that decision, Peterson shared that he hopes it will provide continuity for the students’ use of AVID strategies and allow him to reinforce those habits.
Peterson is also teaching his second AVID class at Clinton High this year, and he is hopeful he can use what he learned last year to continue building his skills as an AVID teacher.
“I also think it is important for parents and the community to understand that AVID is not simply about helping students get through high school. It is about preparing students for what comes next,” Peterson stressed.
He concluded: “Teaching AVID has reinforced something I already believe strongly as an educator: sometimes students don’t need someone to tell them what they cannot do — they need someone to help them discover what they are capable of doing.”
For more information about AVID in the city schools, visit the Clinton City Schools website — www.clinton.k12.nc.us