SAUSD's Amplifying Leadership Podcast

15. Preparing and Supporting Our Students for the Future: High School Inc. and the Power of Community Partnerships, Part 1

• Bianca Barquin • Season 2 • Episode 2

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Unlock the secrets of transforming education and community in Orange County with Felix Lugo, Executive Director, and Mark McLaughlin, Board President of High School Inc. This episode promises to leave you inspired as we explore how their innovative partnership with the Santa Ana Unified School District and the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce has expanded from impacting just 90 students in 2006 to over 1,700 today. Discover the diverse academies in culinary, healthcare, automotive, new media, global business, and engineering, and how these pathways not only prepare students for the workforce but also build a strong community foundation. Felix and Mark share their personal educational journeys and motivations, revealing the powerful impact of dedicated individuals in shaping the future of education.

Felix recounts a teacher's unwavering support that propelled him towards a career dedicated to empowering youth, while Mark shares his transition from business to education, driven by a desire to provide students with opportunities for success. The episode offers insights into the significance of real-world experiences, with students gaining hands-on industry knowledge through internships, mentorships, and job shadowing. Learn about successful partnerships with industries such as hospitality and the growing connections in healthcare and engineering. This episode is a testament to the transformative power of collaboration and innovation in education, ensuring students are well-prepared for future opportunities.

Visit us at our Buzzsprout site for more ways to listen, links to our social media sites and any referenced materials, and complete transcripts of our full-length episodes: https://bit.ly/SAUSDAmplifyingLeadership

Bianca Barquin:

Welcome back to SAUSD's Amplifying Leadership, where we dive into the hearts and minds shaping our educational landscape. I'm your host, Bianca Barquin, and today we have an insightful episode for you. Joining us are High School Inc.'s Executive Director, Felix Lugo, and High School Inc.'s Board President, Mark McLaughlin. These two passionate and dynamic leaders are part of the team driving educational change through High School Inc., providing our students with unique pathways to success beyond the classroom. Welcome, gentlemen.

Mark McLaughlin:

Thank you.

Felix Lugo:

Thank you for having us.

Bianca Barquin:

So I'd like to jump right in with a question, and it's for you, Felix. For our listeners who might be unfamiliar with the program what is High School Inc., who does it serve and what is its mission?

Felix Lugo:

High School Inc. is a unique partnership with Santa Ana Unified School District, Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce, and a nonprofit organization which is High School Inc., and we serve the students of Orange County. Its mission is to empower youth, strengthen communities through education and business partnerships.

Bianca Barquin:

Awesome. This is a transformative opportunity for our students. I love the connections that we really have between the Chamber, between High School Inc., between SAUSD, and all of this is actually in our Graduate Profile, so what a beautiful way to help our students really achieve those learner outcomes. My next question is actually for you, Mark. Can you tell us some history about High School Inc.? How did the program come about and what has changed over the years? Because I know it has evolved a lot to move the program forward.

Mark McLaughlin:

Sure, thank you, I appreciate the lead in there. We have been involved in the school district since 2006, but even earlier, in the timeframe 2003, 2004, we, as a chamber organization came to school and said to the superintendent at the time, which was Jane Russo, we said, you're not giving us educated students that match up with the industries that exist in Orange County. And that's been the core of our existence. At this point in time, we have what we call the change academies, so we have culinary, healthcare, automotive, new media, global business and engineering, and all of those academies have been set up since day one. Now how did we get those academies?

Mark McLaughlin:

We actually solicited help from Dr. Walrod, and he looked at the economy and the base and the industries that exist in Orange County. First he looked at it back in 2005, and then again in 2012, and we found that there was little or no change in the industries. We just know that the changes within the industries were a lot faster than what they were, and so it's the old adage that says 50% of what we learn today is going to be obsolete in five years, and that's one of the things that we feel that we have to keep up with that pace, if not faster. So that's been a challenge for us, but we've been lucky in that we've been able to expand the size of classes. In fact, we started out with 50 to 90 students back in 2015.

Mark McLaughlin:

And now at Valley we've got a little over 1,700 students that are involved with High School Inc.

Bianca Barquin:

Wow, that is incredible 1,700 students.

Bianca Barquin:

From what was the number in 2015?

Mark McLaughlin:

It started out between 50 and 90 students. At the end of the year it was 90 students and it was across the board. Most of it was global business, because at the time, global business was, in fact, still a Lighthouse Academy for Valley High School. It was the only academy at that time. Then we added the other five.

Bianca Barquin:

So I'm doing a lot of work right now with the Institute for the Future, and that's something that we are constantly thinking about. You're looking at drivers and you're looking at signals out there to really figure out what the future looks like and what the needs are, and you all have been doing this from the very beginning, from its inception, which is incredible and really looking at what the future workforce actually needs in preparing our students. What amazes me and really touches my heart is not only are you preparing our students for industry, but you're also preparing them to support their own community, which I think is a beautiful thing, and the fact that now we have 1,700 students involved is, wow. It's just a huge number.

Mark McLaughlin:

And remember, in the next couple of days we're going to be doing a ribbon cutting for Century. We'll probably have three, Felix, three or four hundred students?

Felix Lugo:

Yeah, absolutely. A t Century High School in Santa Ana we're doing our ribbon-cutting ceremony, November 4th, Monday, 3:30, starting specifically with their biomedical pathway program.

Bianca Barquin:

That is incredible. So explain to our listeners who may not be familiar. So the affiliation originally was with Valley High School, right, and now talk about what the future—I mean, and we'll get to it a little bit later. But talk to us a little bit about how did we end up at Century as well, because what a great opportunity for students.

Mark McLaughlin:

Well, actually, let's go back to Valley and if you remember, back in that timeframe 2005 or 2006, we had a situation where we had four schools that were underperforming: Saddleback, Valley, Century, and Santa Ana High School, and the State was threatening to take control of those schools if nothing was done and Valley took it upon itself to take the High School Inc. model and use that as their recovery. And we've been very successful with that. And what's happened now is that with the Century project that's going to start up next week, the situation there was that the principal came and said, 'I want to be able to offer High School Inc. to our students at Century.' In fact, Jerry has mentioned a couple of times the principal came to us and say she wanted to have that done in the same way Valley was doing High School Inc. She wanted it a Century.

Felix Lugo:

And if I can add, Mark, you know 16 years ago Valley High School graduation rate was in the 60 percentile. Since High School Inc. started the academies at Valley, their graduation rate is at a steady 95 percent. So when you look at those numbers it was no question that High School Inc. will do many wonderful things at Century and we're going to start that chapter with the ribbon cutting ceremony on Monday.

Bianca Barquin:

I'm super excited about that. So it's really about adapting to meet the students' and community's needs. It's so important that our programs evolve with the local community and business trends to achieve, you know, our mutual goals. So now I want to talk to you a little bit about your professional and personal journeys. So let me start with Mark. What inspired you to get involved with High School Inc. and its mission?

Mark McLaughlin:

I was at the time just new to joining the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce and they really took the leadership role in the beginning to bring High School Inc. into the school district. And so just watching and seeing some of the fabulous business owners that existed and corporations in Santa Ana saying that they need that level of support in the classroom just to make the students become part of the economy in Santa Ana. The fact was is that we had a tremendously strong business community through the Chamber of Commerce and great leadership and we were able to have several people on our team become part of the first team between Santa Ana Unified and Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce. So we were able to put that together and, as we said, it's grown from 50 to 90 students to 1,700 students. The fact is that with this growth we've also brought on a lot of business people on our board. When we created our board in the beginning it was half school district and half business partners.

Mark McLaughlin:

Now we have a board that is set up in such a way that we have all business partners. We've got 20 business partners and we have one trustee from the Santa Ana Unified School District, and so the growth has been in many different ways. It's gone from having more businesses supported by High School Inc. It's also brought in mentors, internships and programs like that, and the growth of that is only really starting to hit the ground. We've been working on it for a number of years and I think at this point in time you'll see a big change in that area where we bring in more business partners and more internships. We're just trying to do our best there.

Bianca Barquin:

This is really beautiful work and it's amazing to me the synergy when everybody comes together and just to see the evolution. I am just in awe because I have experienced and seen personally the incredible work that's done through the partnership with High School Inc. So, Felix, moving on to you, can you tell us about your own educational journey and how it shaped your path towards leadership?

Felix Lugo:

Absolutely. So I remember in high school, freshman year, I failed-- everything. I even failed PE. Like how do you fail PE, it's the most easiest thing to do, right? But I remember a teacher who pulled me to the side and said a couple of words I cannot say, but it was inspiring words from emotions, and she said, 'I'm not going to let you fail, this is never going to happen again.' So she put the fear in God and me, right, but she was passionate and I knew that she cared and I graduated because I didn't want to let her down, and actually I graduated valedictorian and I told her in my speech you know what you did for me, I don't have to say it and she looked at me and I looked at her in the crowd and you know it was a moment that I will never forget.

Felix Lugo:

So for me, I naturally started helping people in the field of education because I wanted to be her, to continue to help young people and never give up on them. So I started my educational journey professionally. I was working at a school in Florida and I was originally trying to find a job in the medical field, because I went to school studying health services and so forth and I wasn't finding anything. And then someone told me well, won't you apply for something outside of the health field? And I applied to this school just to be a weekend recreation staff member. It's a private school.

Felix Lugo:

And I did the interview and, long story short, they said, 'We know you came in for this, but would you be our residential dean?' I didn't know what that was and that was basically in charge of 60 students in the dormitory, 10 staff members, and it was really just to amplify their experience as a student, making sure that they feel safe, making sure that we create an environment where they can call this place a home away from home. And ever since, and that was in the early 2000s, I started working in education and helping students with activities, homework, projects, and so forth. And I continue working in various schools, from working in their residential, to marketing, to recruitment, and so forth. And that's really what shaped me to continue this work that I'm doing in servicing the youth and helping their careers and really tap into potential, because it started when I was young, someone not giving up on me, and I fell in love with education not giving up on them.

Bianca Barquin:

I think that's beautiful, how you just fell into education by wanting to pay it forward, right? Somebody actually believed in you and did that for you, and it reminds me in education the power of relationships and just how important that educator is, right, and they need to have that relationship with a person or a child and deeply care about them, and you're unaware that you make a difference, right, for that child in their future. And we're just blessed to have you working with students every single day, so I'm really happy you didn't go into the medical field. I think that you're exactly where you need to be.

Felix Lugo:

No, no. And to add on that, in the medical field, normally you wait until people get sick. But what if you can educate people before they even get there? So that's how I look at education. What if you can educate the youth enough that they won't make choices in their life that will end them in the wrong path? And that's the way I looked at it when I made the switch from the medical field to the education field.

Bianca Barquin:

Beautiful, that prevention is so important. Okay, I'm going to switch to Mark. How has your work at High School Inc. impacted you personally, both in your professional life and outside of it?

Mark McLaughlin:

Let's start out by saying I'm retired out of business at this point in time, but one of the goals that I had when I finished working in industry was that I wanted to come back and do something from an education perspective.

Mark McLaughlin:

I really felt that, you know, where I got to and how I was able to see many different things over the course of my career, I just felt that, you know, that was due to education, understanding. And as a result, I figured that I could do something back and help the kids today which would give them the same success or same opportunity that I was able to get. So my wife and I both have said you know we're going to work in education. She's the CFO for Santa Ana Unified School District's Foundation and, you know, I'm the president of High School Inc. Foundation. So,, you know we're there, we're working on it and, you know, we're going to continue to do the whole thing. Because from my standpoint, it's always great to watch these kids talk and show the things that they want to do, how they want to do it, but recognize that there's also a lot of challenges that they go through on a day-to-day basis and if we can make it a little bit easier for that student to succeed, that, to me, is a huge accomplishment. Huge accomplishment. And I'll give you one little anecdote.

Mark McLaughlin:

I was in a group meeting about two or three years ago and it was the ambassadors and we were talking about the ambassador groups that helped to spread the word about High School Inc. within Valley and outside of Valley, and it was interesting. But one of the students turned around and said, 'If that old guy back there can show up at the competitions for us in cooking up change, then I'm going to support him, as he's supporting me.' And I started out with first, 'Where's the old guy in the room?' But it was true. I mean, yeah, but this kid was really sincere in saying that he felt compelled to do the best he could do because I was there supporting him and I think that's, in and of itself, good enough for me. I'm happy with that and as long as I continue to do things like that, I'm going to continue to do things like that.

Bianca Barquin:

Thank you. That was an important question for me to ask you, because I personally know just how much time and energy and dedication and the longevity that you and Janelle, your beautiful wife, have given to our community and given to our kiddos, and just how much you deeply care about every student in Santa Ana, and we appreciate you. So thank you for sharing your 'why.' Okay, Felix, back to you. I want to know and I want to talk a little bit about motivation what keeps you motivated and energized in your role as executive director of an organization focused on high school education.

Felix Lugo:

Thank you. That's a great question. If I can share a story where my true motivation comes from: So in New York City I grew up next to one of my friends and one of my friends knocks on my door and says, 'Hey, come to my house, I have something to show you.' And I went over and he showed me a guitar and he looked at me. He said, 'I don't know how to play this guitar, but I bought a book to teach me the chords. I'm going to learn how to play it.' And he gripped that guitar while looking at it and he said, 'I don't know, Felix, I feel like with this I'm going to make it.'

Felix Lugo:

My friend today, fast Fast forward, forward is one of the biggest Latin singers in Latin music industry. That in itself taught me that it's possible. So when I'm in working education, I look at the students and say it's possible that no matter where you're from, how you grew up, what cards card you were dealt, it's possible to change your life. It's possible to reach success, to dream and dream big and make it happen. I've I seen it, I felt it, and that's what really motivates me to be in this work.

Felix Lugo:

That's what motivated me to be with High School Inc., is to help amplify their experience while in high school, because in high school you only have one experience, right, of high school, and High School Inc. is all about, you know, exposing them to many different things. Let them learn and touch and feel and explore and think like what I want to do with my life and being able to be part of that journey with them, and that's what motivates me, because I know it's possible. I know it's possible no matter where you're from that you can make it in your life. Now I intentionally left out my famous friend's, uh, you know, who he is...

Bianca Barquin:

Wait, I'm dying to know. Come on, you can't just leave us hanging here.

Felix Lugo:

All right, I won't leave you hanging. His real name is Anthony. We always know him as Ant. His stage name is Romeo Santos. He believed in himself. I grew up in the same neck of the woods as he did, you know, in his neighborhood, but he never stopped and he continued to do his thing and he continued to flourish. And if you know him, you know that he's a huge star. But that's what I tell students, that it is possible. Keep dreaming, keep believing. Let High School Inc. help you. We will give you opportunities to do internships, mentorships, job shadowing, to really show you what's out there in the world, that you have an opportunity, and we will find those opportunities for you and create those opportunities. And it's your right to get those opportunities. And that's what High School Inc. does. And that's what motivates me to be the executive director and be in this work with Mark and everyone else with High School Inc., is to show the students that, you know, no matter what it is in the world, you're able to attain it and be successful in it.

Bianca Barquin:

I love it. The themes that are popping out for me are hope, relentless belief, teaching children how to advocate for themselves and never give up, and it ties directly to our theme that we have this year, which is 'Imagine the Unimaginable', right? So it's that same belief, so directly aligned. Thank you. I'd like to shift gears and come back to High School Inc. Mark, High School Inc. partners with various industries to provide real-world experiences for students. What are some of those industries and how do you build and maintain those partnerships? Because there are a lot of them.

Mark McLaughlin:

Yeah, and we're trying to add larger populations to our list, as far as, it's not like a one-off type internship or one-off type student getting out and seeing what's going on, it's getting more of a group between 10, 20, 30. And I'll give you one example. We had Westin Hotel, one of our business partners. Westin Hotel turned around and said we'll give your students a week of internship at our Westin Hotel in Palm Desert and yeah, everybody wants to go there. Initially we couldn't get guidance people or people from the district to support the kids from the standpoint of being around there and being the mentor for the day. But anyway, we did get the opportunity and we had 10 students show up at the Westin Hotel and it was an incredible experience. They stayed there, they ate all meals, they cooked the meals. They were really part of the whole thing. In fact, there was one lady who got up at four in the morning every morning and shadowed the workers throughout the hotel just to learn what it took to do the things that you have to do when you're in the hospitality business. Everything was monitored by the HR manager for Westin and they did a fantastic job coming back and feeding back to the student what they did well, what they needed to work on and improve, and it was a great partnership. And we're going to do the same thing this coming summer with our interns. We're going to get a team of kids back there.

Mark McLaughlin:

What's happening right now is building the business partnerships has been a challenge. Some of it's internal. We all know about the SAM insurance and things of that nature and liabilities and stuff. So we're working through those and I think we've kind of come to the end of the road to be able to say we're there. And, given that, we're also working on large groups, KPC for instance. I was talking to Celeste the other day and she's very close to signing an MOU with KPC. This could give us 100-plus students throughout the hospital system and those are challenges that we've been working with. But the more we can do, the more we can get the kids into the industry that they like to be part of, the more we can get the kids enthusiastic about success and not worry about the things that happen on a day-to-day basis at home or anything like that, because they know they've got a pathway that's going to get them to something that's going to be a good job, a good opportunity, a good learning experience.

Mark McLaughlin:

I think if we succeed in that, we're going to succeed in what we're trying to do overall for High School Inc. We've got other examples too. I mean we've been strong in healthcare. Healthcare has been a great program for our kids. We've got kids going to engineering, to JPL and things of that nature. So we have goals and we're trying to get more mentors in, more internships.

Mark McLaughlin:

And one thing that we're trying to also do a little experimentation on is externships, and I think that's one of the challenges that we have with this whole program, and that is that the teachers have to be aware of what's going on in the industry right now. If they don't participate, then I think we've lost something there with the student, because the student's going to come in more enthusiastic and more capable of saying this is what they really need to do today, and the teacher's going to say, 'Well, where'd you learn that from? How did that come about?' I think what we have to do is we really have to build up that portion of the program, because I think, once we get the buy-in from the teachers and the administrators that are needed for these different classifications and different pathways, I think we'll be more successful, a lot more successful.

Bianca Barquin:

I agree, I think you're on to something there. I talk to people all the time about the future and just where we're headed and the importance of not just having kids learn things in theory, right, but it's that practical application, it's that experiential learning, it's that ability to enjoy it, struggle with it, to do it personally that really teaches them. Externships-- I hadn't really thought about that before. That's truly the next step. I definitely see that as well, and I can't wait to see what happens when you bolster that piece, what it's going to look like, because I think you're exactly right.

Mark McLaughlin:

And I'll say this. Some of the charters and some of the other organizations throughout Southern California--o ne of the things that we've seen is that the way they've come against that challenge and been successful in taking care of it is they're retired out of engineering, so they've got an older set of teachers, but they also have teachers that have been in the industry, understand the industry, and know what's necessary to be successful in that industry. I think that's the other thing that we have to look at is trying to build some of those relationships up and bring teachers in that are going to be the teachers that can help guide ourselves through these pathways.

Bianca Barquin:

These are great practices we're talking about. I love it.

Voiceover:

Hey, there, Amplifiers Our insightful conversation with High School Inc. isn't over yet. Join us next Friday for part two of this episode. See you then.