Phia Vue welcomes you! (photo courtesy of Ka Hang)

• Harding has two Gates Millennium Scholarship winners (2006 & 2008)
• The amount of scholarships earned by Harding grads increases every year!
  
  • 2005: $864,410
  • 2006: $2,972,000
  • 2007: $4,549,574
  • 2008: $8,165,352
  • 2009: $8,244,760
• Harding offers:
  • 30+ After School Organizations
  • 6+ College Access programs
  • Varsity and Junior Varsity sports
  • Theater
  • Music
  • Extended Day and After school tutoring
  • State of the Art College & Career Center
  • A culturally diverse International Baccalaureate Program 
  • 5 Small Learning Communities
  • Job Shadowing Program
  • Parent/Guardian organizations
  • Business and Community Partnerships
  • A tradition of welcoming new populations
  • Volunteer and Service Learning Opportunities
  • Safe, friendly learning environmen

• Harding students graduate prepared!
• • 93.12% have completed Post-Secondary Education Plans
  • 93% have career goals and plans for reaching those goals
  • 100% complete a 6 Year Plan from 9th grade through 2 years post-graduation
    

Harding is a place to prepare for your future while developing creative and critically thinking minds.

Professional Learning Communities

Harding High School has implemented an initiative focusing on student learning called Professional Learning Communities (PLC).  Professional Learning Communities focus on learning rather than on teaching by working collaboratively as educators as well as holding yourself accountable for results. Teachers and staff are partnering to work together building relationships, sharing ideals, creating a strong culture of learning, goal setting and measurments of learning. Teachers and staff are partnering, sharing goals and ideas with other teachers to enhance the learning outcomes for all students. Harding staff is committed to student learning. The idea of PLC is explained by the following quote:

 "If schools are to be significantly more effective, they must break from the  industrial model upon which they were created and embrace a new model that enables them to function as learning organizations. We prefer characterizing learning organizations as ‘professional learning communities’ for several vital reasons. While the term ‘organization’ suggests a partnership enhanced by efficiency, expediency, and mutual interests, ‘community’ places greater emphasis on relationships, shared ideals, and a strong culture – all factors that are critical to school improvement. The challenge for educators is to create a community of commitment – a professional learning community.”  (DuFour & Eaker, 1998, as cited in James, L. (2005).

Small Learning Communities Harding High School is a highly competitive International Baccalaureate (IB) School that has its foundations in small learning communities. The school is divided into 5 academies. All 9th graders are members of the 9th grade academy. For grades 10-12, depending on interests, students join one of the following:

• Academy of Fine Arts
• Human Services Academy
• Medical and Environmental Studies Academy
• Science, Engineering, & Industrial Technology Academy

• School-wide writing improvement plan
• Foundations advisories
• Systematic academic interventions for students
• Collaborative teams in course content areas to build curriculum, common assessments and intervention strategies

Harding staff teams together so all students at Harding will learn.

As a school community, it is our expectation that all students will achieve their highest potential. The school community includes all Harding staff, St Paul community and families. We have an energetic staff. We have many strong community connections. We have one of the most active parent's organization of all St Paul schools. It is of upmost importance the family participates in every aspect of the school. Family  involvement (including parents, guardians, siblings, aunts and uncles) is vital to student success. Harding offers many opportunities for family participation.

Writing Initiative Update

Harding Students Demonstrate Growth as Writers

 This year at Harding we have continued our commitment to improve student writing across the curriculum.  In addition to the content area courses, students have focused on developing their writing skills to reflect, develop critical thinking skills, and to learn new information within Advisory.   This habit of writing, which began by keeping a writer’s notebook, is the first step to our success as writers.   In addition, students have been given three opportunities this school year to write a one-paragraph response to a prompt, which was scored by the entire Harding staff on a 6-point rubric, modeled after the state of Minnesota’s rubric for the GRAD test in Writing.  Our prompts included the following:

• October: Life as a teenager can be challenging.  Describe a challenge you have faced as a teenager.
• January: Everyone has hopes and dreams for themselves, their family, or the world in which they live.  Describe one of your hopes or dreams.
• March: Some people believe that experience is the greatest teacher.  Describe an important lesson that you have learned from an experience you have had during your life.

 We set our building-wide writing goal as follows:  By the end of the 2008-2009 school year, 30% of all students will have improved their score by at least one point on our 6-point rubric.  It is important to note that during the 2007-2008 school year, approximately 24% of our students improved their score by one or more points.