Baltimore’s Re-Engagement Center Helps High School Students Graduate

Accord­ing to the lat­est KIDS COUNT^® Data Book, 13% of Mary­land high school­ers do not grad­u­ate on time. In Bal­ti­more, high school stu­dents who have dropped out, or are at risk of quit­ting school, are referred to Bal­ti­more City Pub­lic Schools’ Re-Engage­ment Cen­ter (REC) for support.

“The Re-Engage­ment Cen­ter has been an incred­i­bly impor­tant resource for Bal­ti­more high school­ers strug­gling to stay con­nect­ed to school,” said Michael Cam­lin, a senior asso­ciate with the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion. ​“For the bet­ter part of a decade, it has pro­vid­ed young peo­ple with the help they need to grad­u­ate and suc­ceed beyond the classroom.”

What Is the REC?

Cre­at­ed in 2016, the REC offers holis­tic sup­port­ive ser­vices to help young adults attend school and earn a diplo­ma, with offer­ings such as:

• men­tor­ship;
• men­tal health and well­ness sessions; 
• sub­stance abuse screen­ing and support;
• pro­gram­ming focused on job readi­ness and life skills devel­op­ment; and
• con­nec­tions to local sup­port­ive ser­vices, orga­ni­za­tions and agencies.

Recent­ly, the REC diver­si­fied its ser­vices with on-site social work­ers, an evening school for work­ing stu­dents, tar­get­ed out­reach for Lati­no stu­dents and pro­gram­ming for home­less or pregnant/​parenting students.

“Bar­ri­ers to school com­ple­tion are often inter­con­nect­ed. A stu­dent in Bal­ti­more may be preg­nant, strug­gling with their men­tal health and fac­ing home­less­ness simul­ta­ne­ous­ly,” said Roger Shaw, the Center’s exec­u­tive direc­tor. ​“The REC ensures stu­dents have the sup­port they need — whether that’s child care, evening class­es or oth­er wrap­around ser­vices — to nav­i­gate these issues.”

Since the begin­ning of the 2020–2021 school year, the center’s intake and place­ment num­bers have more than tripled. Dur­ing the 2023–2024 school year, 1,500 stu­dents re-engaged with school, and 600 stu­dents grad­u­at­ed thanks to the REC.

Intro­duc­ing the REC Tran­si­tion Center

Last year, the REC launched the Tran­si­tion Cen­ter to bet­ter serve stu­dents with juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem involve­ment. ​“Not only are these stu­dents the largest sub­group the REC cur­rent­ly serves, they have the most com­plex needs of the stu­dents we sup­port,” said Shaw. He not­ed that for­mer­ly incar­cer­at­ed young peo­ple often require greater men­tal health, men­tor­ship and aca­d­e­m­ic assis­tance because of their time in con­fine­ment. ​“Research has shown that the most effec­tive way to ensure stu­dents do not return to the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem is by con­nect­ing them [with] oppor­tu­ni­ties to pur­sue an edu­ca­tion and employment.”

Joint­ly sup­port­ed by the Casey Foun­da­tion, the Abell Foun­da­tion, the Sher­man Fam­i­ly Foun­da­tion and the Har­ry and Jeanette Wein­berg Foun­da­tion, the Tran­si­tion Cen­ter offers:

• a ded­i­cat­ed three-per­son staff that includes two for­mer Depart­ment of Juve­nile Ser­vices man­agers, who are aware of the chal­lenges young peo­ple face dur­ing and after incarceration;
• access to men­tors who guide stu­dents as they re-enter school and their communities;
• a career readi­ness cur­ricu­lum that helps stu­dents devel­op employ­ment skills and gain con­nec­tions to intern­ships and job place­ments; and
• tem­po­rary emer­gency aid for students.

The Cen­ter also main­tains open lines of com­mu­ni­ca­tion with city agen­cies, which noti­fy the REC when stu­dents leave the crim­i­nal or juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem so they can be con­nect­ed to ser­vices imme­di­ate­ly. It hopes to reen­gage at least 300 stu­dents dur­ing its first year of operation.

“We applaud the REC for work­ing to reverse the school-to-prison pipeline, which has pushed some of the most vul­ner­a­ble stu­dents out of school and into the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem,” said Cam­lin. ​“By cre­at­ing a path back to school for youth who have been caught up in the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem, the Tran­si­tion Cen­ter is mod­el­ing how pub­lic sys­tems should work togeth­er to ensure that all youth have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to suc­ceed in school and beyond.”

Dis­cov­er how Bal­ti­more schools are help­ing stu­dents tran­si­tion to col­lege and careers