The school board is toying with creating a mission statement that would help guide the actions of the district and the approach it takes towards educating the Valley’s students. Many suggestions have been batted about at past meetings, none satisfying to the group as a whole. At issue is the very definition of student achievement.
Board member Nicole Abate Ducarroz said she has a really hard time with the California’s categorization of students into the various subgroups. “Each student is an individual and we need to look at the whole education we’re providing, not just the test scores. For me, it’s four pieces that come together to make a sound student: intellect combined with social, emotional and physical development.”
Regardless, test the district must and at this time of year, STAR test scores are what guide many of the decisions being made. As a response to the scores, the school board held a special board meeting to specifically address student achievement.
While to some the pace of progress may seem glacial, growth is actually being made in math and language arts subject areas, according to test results. “It’s nice to see that our work is starting to pay off,” said Louann Carlomagno, the district’s director of curriculum and instruction.
When looking at the English Language Arts Adequate Yearly Progress report in the category “all students,” with 45 percent being the targeted goal, schools in the district met and exceeded the goal with 48.7 percentile of students being proficient.
And while that number shows encouraging growth, it is still a very long way off from the state’s ultimate goal of 100 percent proficiency by 2014 as stated in the No Child Left Behind legislation and reflected in the district’s Local Education Agency Plan.
A similar picture was painted in math achievement when looking at the “all students” category.
However, when the numbers are broken out into various subgroups like English Language Learners, socioeconomically disadvantaged or Hispanic/Latino students, the numbers don’t always meet the target. Despite this, the district is encouraged that it’s moving in the right direction.
“Even in the subgroups where we didn’t meet the target we still showed growth. That’s promising,” said Carlomagno.
Another interesting piece of the puzzle is the results from the California English Language Development Test. The CELDT is given every year to every single English Language learner from kindergarten through 12th grade to assess reading, writing, listening and speaking skills. When looking at these scores it is encouraging to see significant gains were made at four out of five of the Valley’s elementary schools, and at Adele Harrison Middle School.
Test scores and mission statements aside, the next step for the school board and the district is to accelerate student achievement, no matter the definition. The plan: continue working with Pivot Learning Partners; work with content coaches to provide effective instructional practices in math and language arts to kindergarten through 12th grade teachers; and importantly, being accountable and making adjustments to the program based on available data.
