Who We Are

NCSL is committed to students’ success!

The NCSL focuses with unrelenting determination on changing the short- and long-term outcomes for American high school and college students. The NCSL intends to be the premier voice and catalyst on college success strategies that elevate the capacity of American students and build upon family, state, and national investments in our economic future. The NCSL leverages evidence-based programs and strategies and a progressive approach to learning to build the capacity of students through individually targeted programs, strategic partnerships, and dissemination of educational and economic data and trends.

 

Vision

NCSL will become the national leader for students, families, and P-16 educators on student leadership and college success.

Mission

Leverage unrelenting determination, inspiring expertise, and uncompromising integrity to assist students with achieving their collegiate and professional dreams while building upon the economic investment of families, schools, states, and the nation.

Values

  • Integrity: Maintain the highest degree of integrity;

  • Disruptive: Reverse longstanding negative trends by promoting disruptive innovations and strategies;

  • Results-Oriented: Focus on outcomes and results;

  • Diversity: Celebrate the value diversity brings to every aspect of our organization;

  • Accessible: Offer accessible programs and technology to all stakeholders; and

Value Proposition

  • Student participants will be significantly better positioned to succeed in college and beyond.

  • Student participants will be candidates of choice for colleges and employers.

  • NCSL will offer “out of the box” opportunities for agency and institutional partners that will expand opportunities for their student participants and support the achievement of long-term organizational goals.

“There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.” – Beverly Sills

How we approach organizational success:

The Hamilton Project, whose relevance is more evident today than ever before, explains that we have a national educational crisis and that a critical part of the solution must include addressing how we measure educational success and the role that school and district leadership plays in advancing our national educational priorities (Lessons for Broadening School Accountability under Every Student Succeeds Act, Oct. 2016). According to their strategy paper (Oct. 2016):

1.  What gets measured gets done: To broaden the scope of school improvement tasks, one approach would be to expand the domains that are measured.

2.  The goal has to be in reach: Goals that are out of reach may not induce desired behavior changes.

3.  Beware - goalposts can be moved: Indicators can change over time by moving passing thresholds, altering how outcomes are measured, or introducing or replacing measures which obscure true gains and losses.

4.  When the measure becomes the target: When stakes are attached to a measure, schools can employ strategies to raise their performance in ways that do not necessarily align to the broader goal. For example, shifting from taking attendance from homeroom to third period may change the statistic but it doesn’t necessarily change attendance patterns. 

These are the challenges that national, state, and regional educational leaders face and why data from one year to the next should be viewed cautiously as more and more students struggle academically at the higher education level.

NCSL is committed to providing quantifiable and attainable goals that we will measure over the long-term and report on our success and how we overcome our challenges.