WHAT RESEARCH SAYS: Transition from Middle School into High School

I urge the next generation of middle school educators to help save the ninth grade. The middle school concept has, too often, not been able to fulfill its announced intention to make the transition to high school a smooth and successful experience. In fact, the transition to high school has never been more treacherous nor the consequences more personally disastrous for so many. All over America, thousands and thousands of ninth graders are and have been painfully failing. ...We can no longer allow all the good work you do in middle schools to evaporate in the first six weeks of high school. (George, 1999)