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development. Nonetheless, administra-
tors seek to integrate AVID techniques
throughout their curriculum to maxi-
mize student success. Peterson reported
that though the AVID elective course
serves only 15 percent of the student
population at Wa-Hi, his goal is to have
all of his teaching staff using AVID strate-
gies. Jameson said that at College Place
High School they choose from among
various AVID strategies and use the ones
they think are most successful. Vaughan
reported that Nike has provided a grant
to fund professional development to
support AVID schoolwide at McLoughlin
High School and AVID elective sections
for first-generation college students.
Music education
Music education helps students de-
velop many 21st century skills. Music
practice encourages critical thinking,
complex decision making and prob-
lem solving, because playing requires
one to disassemble a piece of music to
learn it and reassemble it to perform it.
Performance teaches the communica-
tion of a message to an audience, de-
veloping intention, poise, confidence,
self-awareness, and self-expression.
Music literacy demands skill acquisi-
tion, math competency, and scientific
reasoning and teaches history and
literature. In practice, ensemble work
requires teamwork and consensus
building. Like the performing arts,
music education relies on the passage
of school levies.
Dual-language education
According to Jennifer Cowgill, Principal
of Edison Elementary, dual-language
education (instruction in both English
and a second language from kinder-
garten through at least fifth grade)
affirms self-identity, promotes prob-
lem-solving skills and supports cultural
sophistication to work across cultural
barriers. Dual-language education
also promotes metalanguage aware-
ness, which helps students to see the
world through multiple perspectives.
Research suggests that the neurocog-
nitive benefits of bilingualism increase
when a student reaches a high level
of proficiency (which can take 5 to
10 years of study, depending on the
context). Those benefits include the im-
provement of executive function, which
supports problem solving and decision
making. Because executive functioning
skills are important to student success,
they should be promoted throughout
our educational system.
STEM education
STEM education is an approach that
integrates science, technology, engi-
neering, and math. Through rigorous,
hands-on learning experiences, STEM
education promotes critical thinking,
problem solving, and collaborative
team work. Peggy Harris Willcuts,
Senior STEM Education Consultant for
Pacific Northwest National Labora-
tory, encouraged STEM literacy for
all students, including those who do
not pursue STEM careers, because
STEM skills enable people to trouble-
shoot problems and make informed
decisions. She further suggested that
science education should be of-
fered to all students, K–12, every day,
and that it should be “hands-on and
minds-on,” instead of just textbook
learning. Currently, STEM education
is delivered unevenly throughout
the schools within our region. At the
elementary level that is partly because
many STEM subjects, such as science,
engineering and technology, are not
regularly tested. Willcuts reported that
a second barrier to science education
at the elementary level is that teach-
ers sometimes lack confidence in their
ability to teach subjects outside their
The Little Mermaid
. Photo by Kevin Peck, courtesy of Walla Walla Public Schools.