Increasing College Enrollment

Berea, a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, stakes its claim as the “grindstone capital of the world” and it offers a fitting visual analogy of the work the school district has undertaken to advance student achievement. A grindstone functionally serves as a sharpener and Berea-Midpark High School has used all the tools at its disposal—AP and the SAT Suite of Assessments—in shaping a college- and career-minded student body.

Berea-Midpark High School Principal Dr. Mark Smithberger describes these changes and their positive impact: “We use AP, SAT, and PSAT-related assessments to help guide our decision making at a macro and micro level. This allows for program- and classroom-specific changes based on data.”

District leadership’s work has resulted in a 95% increase in AP Exams taken and a 94% increase in the number of students taking AP courses in the last two years. 

Smithberger adds, “Since we started to analyze the data related to the SAT Suite of Assessments, we increased the number of our graduates attending college by 15 percentage points and went from 0 to 5 students participating in the National Merit® Scholar Program. The SAT Suite is clearly having a positive impact.”