The co-directors of a highly acclaimed international educational partnership will explain the success of their six-year-old partnership during a June 14-15 virtual conference sponsored by the GE Foundation.

College For Every Student (CFES) President and CEO Rick Dalton and Cliona Hannon, Director of Dublin, Ireland’s Trinity College Access Programmes (TAP), will present “The CFES and Trinity College Collaboration in Ireland.” Their presentation will be part of a virtual conference entitled Skills for the Global Digital Revolution.

Dalton and Hannon are among a group of two dozen educators, futurists, policy-makers and community leaders who are being convened by the GE Foundation. All are dedicated to closing the skills gap that prevents so many young persons from entering and graduating from college and becoming career-ready.

“We are very pleased to have CFES present at our first virtual conference,” said GE Foundation Executive Director of Skills and Education Kelli Wells. “The CFES model has been successfully implemented in schools around the United States and adapted in Ireland. We’re looking forward to hearing about the success of CFES and Trinity College Dublin’s partnership.”

Since inception 25 years ago, CFES has partnered with more than 700 K-12 schools and districts in both urban and rural U.S. communities to help more than 100,000 low-income students graduate from high school, prepare for, enter and graduate from college and become career-ready.

The CFES track record is unparalleled: 99 percent of CFES Scholars graduate high school; 95 percent enter and succeed in college and launch solid careers!

In 2012, CFES’s Dalton and Trinity’s Hannon agreed to develop a partnership. The CFES core practices: Pathways to College, Mentoring and Leadership Through Service were adopted Trinity College branded their program “Trinity Access 21” and began to reach out to Dublin secondary schools. CFES tailored its program to meet the specific needs of the Irish schools to assist in raising student performance and postsecondary access and success.

In 2013, the first Dublin school – St. Joseph’s Rush – joined CFES under the Trinity Access 21 umbrella. Today, just three years later, 21 Dublin schools, involving nearly 5,700 students, are participating!

Trinity Access Program Director Hannon cited two examples of the positive impact CFES and TAP have had on two participating Dublin schools. At the Colaiste Bride School, which joined CFES in 2014, early focus was placed on improving chronically poor attendance. Between the 2014-15 and 2015-16 academic years, students with perfect attendance jumped 28 percent; students with near-perfect (98%) attendance soared by 58%.

At St. Mark’s Community School in Dublin, which also joined CFES in 2014, school leaders implemented a three-pronged strategy based upon innovative approaches to the CFES core principles – Pathways to College, Mentoring and Leadership Through Service. The results have been remarkable as the students and the school itself have been transformed.

Referring to the CFES/Trinity TAP collaboration, Dalton said, “We believe that our international partnership is ‘one-of-a-kind.’ Our work together has improved both organizations, spawned great new ideas and established powerful networks.”

A key reason that the CFES Program is flourishing in Ireland, Dalton says, is its adaptability. “Every culture is different and every culture is attuned to different challenges – from city to city, from region to region,” he noted.

CFES has long subscribed to the operational rule that a program can and should be customized to be successful in a given location. “Be adaptable and then adapt,” Dalton concluded. “That’s been our approach and it has served us well.”