There is nothing worse than approaching a situation you aren’t prepared for. Transitioning from high school to college is a big step in a student’s life, but in many cases, they go into this new field feeling unprepared.
So, the question is: Does Lincoln Park successfully prepare students for college?
Not really, says a demographic survey of about 50 current juniors and seniors. About 80 percent of respondents stated they would be attending some form of college after high school. However, The SIREN discovered that nearly 60 percent of those respondents don’t feel prepared for college.
In a similar survey conducted by YouScience in 2022, about three-fourths of students felt moderately, slightly, or not prepared at all for college.
DOES LINCOLN PARK PREPARE ITS STUDENTS ARTISTICALLY FOR COLLEGE?
We had the chance to speak to a few Lincoln Park alumni to ask them if they felt they were adequately prepared for college and the real world. Since this is a performing arts school, this question was asked in two separate parts: academically and artistically.
Kaleb Chesnic, a 2010 music graduate, spent a total of nine years in college, and he believes Lincoln Park helped prepare him for college artistically in tremendous ways.
“I’d say probably 70 percent of the concepts that I learned during my music theory training in undergraduate, I had at least become partially familiar with through my time at Lincoln Park, which is really unusual for a high school,” Mr. Chesnic explains. “Some of [the concepts] I had gotten fully proficient in by the time I left Lincoln Park.”
Olivia Smith, a 2019 writing and publishing graduate, went to Emerson College for writing, literature, and publishing. She says she “felt very confident going to Emerson. It was very much like Lincoln Park 2.0.”
Similarly, some Lincoln Park seniors largely believe that they are artistically prepared for college.
Ella Kurschinke, a senior film and broadcast journalism major from McKees Rocks, believes, “Yes, in my major I learned everything I needed to do in order to get into a good college, as well as a free full ride my first year.”
Not only have students expressed how their artistic fields have helped prepare them for college, but they also share how the block schedule is part of that preparation.
Lincoln Gaines, a film and broadcast journalism senior from Cranberry, says, “I think the block schedule is more college-like than any other campus. I also think the campus itself is more college-like than the normal high schools.”
IS THE LEVEL OF ARTISTIC PREPARATION THE SAME FOR ACADEMICS?
Though most current and graduate students believe that Lincoln Park prepared them for college, there are still flaws that most point out. Academic improvements and business teaching are the biggest challenges expressed by the respondents.
“I believe that with the courses Lincoln Park offered, and considering the kind of school it was, I do think I was as prepared as I could be,” Lily Connor, a 2023 musical theater graduate, writes in an email interview. “Now that I am in a more academically based field, I do find myself feeling like I am ‘behind’ some of my peers.”
Alexa Bocek, a 2019 writing and publishing graduate, has a similar view. “Academically, in my opinion and experience, I feel like Lincoln Park is about on the same level as most high schools,” she says. “Most public schools also offer more in-depth classes, like, more focused English or history classes that I think Lincoln Park sometimes lacks.”
“Academically, I struggle here,” Ella Kurschinke shares. “I’m not the best at schoolwork, but I’m passing enough, and I’m more film and broadcasting-based and less academically.”
While most feel a certain lack of preparation academically, whether big or small, not all students share the same feeling.
“Certain aspects of [academics] helped me with my actual personal stuff, like the personal finance class we have [has] helped me with learning how to correctly use my bank account and how to correctly transfer funds and all that stuff,” Joseph Gacesa, a senior film and broadcast journalism major, says. “So, there was a lot of the academic-based stuff that helped me prepare for a call.”
HOW BIG AN IMPACT DOES LP LEAVE ON STUDENTS?
Most of the alumni that we had the chance to talk to ended up going into some career field involving the major they studied in high school. More specifically, a lot of the important life lessons that people learned from Lincoln Park seem to end up staying with them through the years.
“All of my teachers still have my best interests in mind and want me to succeed even though I am not one of their current students, ” Ms. Connor writes. “They are resources that I use all the time. Whether it be letters of recommendation, career questions, or specifically in my case, help with lesson plans, LP’s teachers have continued to support me even after graduation.”
A 2023 musical theatre graduate, Liam Allen, explains how a specific staff member impacted his journey into college, and even his career.
“Maria Scheller, who I worked with the most, was the one who sat down with me and helped me apply to college. If it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t be here,” Mr. Allen says. “For the love of God, she got me the job I have currently. She told me to apply for it, and then she emailed my boss an apparently glowing letter of recommendation.”
Not only do the teachers impact students’ futures, but Ms. Smith also tells us how her greatest impacts came from her writing classes. “One hundred percent, how to take feedback and criticism. Having that humility and that understanding of it being a collaborative process is something that not a lot of people can easily learn. And so that was absolutely something that I took into college and also in my professional career as well.”
FORMER LP STUDENTS AND CURRENT TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVE ON COLLEGE PREP
While we had the chance to talk to current Lincoln Park students and newly emerging graduates who are beginning to start their careers, we also got the opportunity to get insight from alumni who chose to return to Lincoln Park for a teaching career.
Emily Raught, current media instructor in the fine art and design track, arrived as a student in Lincoln Park the second year it opened, in 2007. At that time, there was no middle school, so she began in ninth grade as a media major, studying film and photography.
After graduating in 2011, Mrs. Raught went on to Oak Bridge Academy of Arts. She got her degree in photography and specialized technology. Her professional career started in different studios. Eventually, she ended up getting a teaching position at Lincoln Park.
In 2015, Jessica McNulty, current English teacher, was graduating from Lincoln Park out of the Literary Arts Department. She went on to a few different colleges after high school, until she ended up teaching in Japan for a year. This year, she joined the faculty at Lincoln Park.
Artistically, Mrs. Raught was able to find opportunities through her college just by being overly skilled in her major. “Since I was a lot more advanced than the people that I was in college with, I also got jobs from my college that they actually paid me to do, like advertisements and different stuff for them, since I knew how to use all the software from coming here.”
Similarly, Ms. McNulty says, “Artistically I was further ahead, because a lot of people who went into creative writing just in college didn’t have that foundation. So, I was further ahead than someone who maybe took one creative writing class in a regular public high school or even private high school.”
As some people may not know, a lot of the opportunities available within arts majors can take you a long way. For Mrs. Raught, joining the staff of Pulp, the school literary journal, on the media side helped her almost immediately after high school.
“Working on Pulp when I was in school here, that was something I actually used right when I started working in my professional career [since I was] working within all this software.”
“I think it’s like any other school,” Ms. McNulty states. “You get out of it what you put in…So, a lot of college preparation, wherever you go, to any school, it’s what you decide you want to put in and being goal-oriented yourself as well. Lincoln Park offers that.”
Although most people we’ve talked to have shared a lower opinion of academic preparation, Ms. McNulty has other opinions.
“I wasn’t unprepared at all for the academics…taking those college [classes] in high school did help a lot. And now I feel like I’m chilling for my own class because I do teach one of the college in high school [classes].”
WHAT COULD LINCOLN PARK DO BETTER
As many have stated, the academic field is one they believe could be better in preparation for college. To learn more, we asked more about this, wondering what specifically would have helped improve people’s preparation.
“The thing that I’ve always wished about Lincoln Park that I think would have been helpful was if they had a wider range of classes to offer,” Mr. Allen says. “When it comes to strictly academics, there’s really just one or two set pathways that you can go down. And I think, for me, it would’ve been really interesting if I got to go and look into something more in depth.”
Mr. Chesnic shares that, in the early days of Lincoln Park, there wasn’t an option to learn the business side of life. “I wish that I had taken more time to learn about the business side of the industry, the sort of marketing side of the industry, and the entrepreneurial side of the industry.”
“I definitely struggled with deciding,” Ms. Bocek explains. “I struggled with making decisions, and I think a part of that was [me] not really being prepared for the real world and how much things change…so I guess like logistical future planning.”
Most current and graduated Lincoln Park students believe their school offers them an advanced knowledge of their respective major; however, some believe there is a lack of the level of academic knowledge students have for college.
“Lincoln Park was a special place,” Mr. Chesnic says. “But I have to say, being gone, and being out in the world, and having had the experience I’ve had since leaving Lincoln Park, it’s only made me appreciate it more and more.
“So, I would say to any current Lincoln Park student that may come across this interview: appreciate it even more than you already do.”
SIREN staff members Aydden Yope and Summer Mccaffrey also contributed to this story.
