6/9/2002
The Boston Globe
THE CHALKBOARD
A hidden pressure on girls: fitting in
By Laura Pappano, Globe Staff
It's the quiet underside of school life: the social world with its pecking
order and nuanced set of rules. Nearly invisible to adults, pressures are
powerfully present to students, who say that negotiating friendships and
social codes are among the toughest things they do.
''You come to school to learn, but there are people around you who are talking
about what you're wearing,'' said Shakiera White, 13, a seventh-grader at
the William H. Taft Middle School in Brighton. ''You are focusing on your
studies, then you are focusing on the he says-she says, then back on your
studies. You get distracted from your work.''
Shakiera was one of 13 girls in Jo-Ann Rogers's class who met recently with
Rosalind Wiseman, author of the book ''Queen Bees & Wannabes,'' which,
along with a spate of new books such as ''Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture
of Aggression in Girls,'' depict a cutthroat social world. In her book,
Wiseman describes the challenges and social pressures girls face. She constructs
a hierarchy of girl culture (with the Queen Bee at the center) and details
what she sees as the rules of female adolescent society.
The specifics may be different, but the basic rules are not new. Anyone
who sang along with Janis Ian's ''At 17'' understands the meanness and elbowing
for social status that is part of teen culture - for girls and boys. It
is so hard not being cool.
Books such as Wiseman's are provoking debate because they strike a nerve.
Every parent knows the pain of talking your child through a hurtful social
interaction. And every teacher knows the frustration of trying to teach
when students are thinking about what just happened in the hallway.
Rogers, a seventh-grade humanities teacher, has been struck by the transformation
of her students from the sixth to seventh grade. She said they now focus
on their hair, criticizing one another if it's not ''done right.''
''At times, it gets a little out of hand,'' Rogers said. ''They want to
spend school time doing their hair and that is not appropriate. In sixth
grade, they never thought about that.''
Rogers sees three cliques of girls in her class - bossy, flirty, and quiet
- and worries about how social pressures will affect the ability to learn.
Will the drive to wear the right clothes and have the right hairstyle take
precedence over the girls' studies?
''The biggest problem my girls are having right now is following the crowd,''
she said. ''They are really at a crossroads.'' Between seventh grade and
eighth grade, said Rogers, students typically decide to exert themselves
academically or turn their energies to their social lives. Schoolwork drifts.
''They are making decisions that are going to affect them long-term, even
though they have no clue,'' she said.
When Wiseman asked, many of the students mentioned ambitious careers for
themselves - as singers, models, doctors, pediatricians, and photographers,
among others. Before the screen test or the medical boards, however, Shakiera
and her classmates have to get through middle school. That may sound easier
than it is.
During the hourlong discussion with Wiseman, a picture emerged of a painstakingly
detailed social order that every student knew by heart. In a role-playing
exercise, students said one girl wasn't being realistic and several described
the issues and comments that would be part of a three-way power struggle
over who would go with whom to a movie.
When Wiseman asked whether girls were jealous, critical, and competitive
with one another, the girls seated in a semicircle answered emphatically:
''Yes.''
What are hot points? Hair, clothes, friends, brand of shoes, jewelry, weight,
intelligence, and race, they said. ''You can't keep in braids that are messed
up,'' said Nydra Martin, 14.
With friends, they said, it's important to be honest and loyal and to communicate
fairly. Leakia Studmire, 13, said it bothers her ''when people rub stuff
in your face that shouldn't be heard.'' Nydra said she likes when friends
''stay real.''
But staying real is not always easy. Wiseman argues that girls embrace roles
in an effort to win power and friendship, roles that may derail who they
truly are and what they hope to become. Shakiera's insight: ''When you've
got everybody seeing you as a popular girl and they see you as acting a
certain way, if you don't act a certain way, they have to change what they
think of you.''
When Wiseman asked girls to close their eyes and raise their hands if schoolmates
had ever criticized their looks or their friends, all put their hands in
the air. When Wiseman asked how many of them had been critical of others
for these same things, all hands went up again.
''Girls can support each other through their teen years or they can tear
each other down,'' Wiseman told the group. At different points during the
discussion, girls described violent confrontations and threats. ''If somebody
says they'll beat you up at the end of the day, you tell your friends, so
your friends have your back,'' said Erin Johnson, 13.
Despite the increased publicity given to violence, particularly among girls,
Nancy Mullin-Rindler of Wellesley College, director of the school's Project
on Teasing and Bullying, said research shows that the most common form of
bullying - among girls or boys - is verbal. Mullin-Rindler said the problem
of bullying, whether verbal or physical, is a problem that must be addressed
at its source. Adults are focusing too much on the offending behavior, and
not its causes, she said.
''The big question is, `Why are they worrying about their hair?' and not
that they are using this as ammo against each other,'' said Mullin-Rindler.
''What are the societal messages that say to girls, `It is how you look
that is important.'?''
==============================================
6/9/2002
Boston Globe
For Lexington students, no fuzzy math
Middle schoolers excel at numbers, head to nationals
By Robert Padgett, Globe Correspondent
Sway Chen stopped counting on her fingers and toes before most children
start. She had no choice; she ran out of digits.
''When I was 2 years old, I could count to 100,'' said Chen, 11, who attends
Jonas Clarke Middle School in Lexington. ''When I was 3, I could add, subtract,
and do some fractions.''
Brimming with confidence and energy, Chen is just one of nine sixth-graders
- including one Shrewsbury teen - who will match wits against about 250
seventh- and eighth-grade math enthusiasts June 13 through 15 at the national
MathCounts competition in Chicago. The event features the top four middle-school
math students in each of the 50 and US territories, who will pursue their
quest in a competitive atmosphere that the Massachusetts coach likens to
''the seventh game of the World Series.''
''I've never been to one of these before, but I hear there's a lot of fierce
competition,'' said Rahul Banerjee, 14, who attends Shrewsbury Middle School.
Joining Chen and Banerjee in representing Massachusetts will be eighth-graders
Eva Rosenberg, 14, who also attends Jonas Clarke Middle School; and Sam
Gross, 12, who attends Chenery Middle School in Belmont.
''The math problems these kids get here is at a level far beyond what their
schools can offer them,'' said Evagrio Mosca, the Massachusetts team coach
and a math teacher at Diamond Middle School in Lexington. ''In fact, the
problem solving is beyond what most middle school and high school math teachers
could do.''
Some of the team members, it would appear, have math in their genes. Gross's
father is a math professor at Harvard University and his mother is a researcher
at the Weatherford Institute. Banerjee's father is a physician; Chen's father
is a physicist and her mother an economist.
But not all the students are math experts' progenies who embraced numbers
early in their youths. Rosenberg, whose father is an editor and mother a
librarian, got hooked on math while taking a workshop in the fifth grade.
''I've improved a lot over the years,'' she said. ''My goal was to make
the national competition before I left eighth grade.''
She almost fell short of that dream earlier this spring at the statewide
finals. After a grueling day of problem solving, Rosenberg learned she had
finished in 11th place, missing the finals by just two points.
After the competition, she checked her numbers with Gross, who in the individual
round had answered all eight questions correctly, and learned they had the
same answers. She filed an appeal, and a week later the judges updated the
score, boosting her standing to fourth place and sending her to the national
finals.
''When the school announced it over the loudspeaker, I burst into tears
and started screaming down the hallway,'' Rosenberg said.
That kind of enthusiasm heartens MathCounts officials. The organization,
formed in 1984, seeks to broaden students' awareness of and involvement
in math. Every year, a half-million students take tests provided by MathCounts;
those who have an interest and skill in math can continue on school teams
and take part in district, regional, and state competitions.
Sponsors of MathCounts include the National Society of Professional Engineers,
General Motors, NASA, Dow Chemical, 3M, Lockheed Martin, and Toyota.
''We're trying to reach middle school students and make sure they are prepared
for math skills before high school,'' said Peggy Drane, executive director
of the MathCounts Foundation. ''Employers are looking to reach students
and prepare them for the work force.''
The Massachusetts students already envision a future that involves math.
All four plan to attend universities such as the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, Harvard, Stanford, and Cal Tech.
''All four of these kids could compete in the national event and then go
take the SAT and score an 800 on the math,'' Mosca said.
''Yeah, the SAT is pretty easy,'' said Gross, an eighth-grader who finished
as the top math student in the state competition this spring. Like his teammates,
Gross takes high school honors math classes.
Despite their focus on geometry and problem-solving, the students also pursue
other activities. All four, for example, play the violin. Banerjee is a
Boy Scout, Gross plays tennis, and Rosenberg is a competitive fencer.
Since the state finals, however, the team members have curtailed their other
interests to sharpen their skills for the national competition.
''I figure I've solved more than 7,000 problems since March,'' or roughly
10 hours a week, Rosenberg said at a recent practice session with her teammates.
The others spent a few seconds figuring numbers in their head and agreed.
While the questions stem from what the students have learned through the
eighth grade, the depth of problem solving is at the college undergraduate
level, Mosca said. At the MathCounts event, the students will compete both
individually and as a team. They will do two individual sprint rounds and
then a team round.
In addition to calculating hundreds of problems each week at home, the students
meet once a week with Mosca for three hours to get acclimated to the team
environment.
''This really is a team event,'' Mosca said. ''There's not enough time for
any one student to dominate. They each do some problems and then check each
other's answers. If there's disagreement, someone has to emerge as a leader
who will have the final say.''
Mosca, who has led four teams to MathCounts national events and whose 1999
team captured first place, is confident of the current team's chances in
Chicago.
''This team will probably wind up in the top 10,'' predicted Mosca. ''They're
very focused and very hungry. They really want to win.''
A recent practice session underscored that desire. After Mosca handed the
team a set of 10 problems to complete in 20 minutes, the four students hurriedly
punched numbers on calculators, scribbled notes, came up with their answers,
and cross-checked the results with one another.
Then the session got intense. The students concurred on most of the results,
but Gross and Banerjee disagreed on one answer. While tempers remained in
check, the two students passionately stated their case, reciting formulas
and holding up pieces of scrap paper containing rough diagrams and equations.
In the end, Gross prevailed.
Later, Mosca informed the team members that they answered nine of 10 questions
correctly. The one error: the disputed question.
Looking at the answers, Gross cast a doleful look, shook his head in disgust
and said, ''I forgot to divide by two. Duh.''
==============================================
05-28-02
Corpus Christi Caller Times
CCISD's renewed reading push focuses on literacy
Percentage of sixth-graders at Haas who met standards up from 79 to 91
in one year
By Tim Eaton
When Cassy Gonzalez began the sixth grade at Haas Middle School in August,
she was reading at the fourth-grade level. But after one school year, she
caught up and expects to keep going.
"Sometimes I like to read at home. If you don't know how to read, what
can you do?" Cassy said. "I feel proud of myself because I did
that, and I am thankful for my teacher."
Cassy's sixth-grade teacher, Faith Evans, is a master reading teacher and
an example of the commitment that Haas and other Corpus Christi Independent
School District schools have placed on reading in the past few years.
Haas Middle School - along with Cullen Middle School and Martin Middle School
- concentrate their instruction on literacy.
Through a grant from the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, which ran out
at the end of the school year, the three schools developed curricula that
centered on getting almost every child to read at or above grade level.
At Haas, the new curriculum seems to be working.
The percentage of students meeting the minimum requirements is up almost
10 percent in the two years since reading became a priority in all classes,
no matter what the subject.
The percentage of sixth-graders meeting minimum standards went from 79 last
year to 91 this year. Seventh- and eighth-grade reading scores also improved.
Scores showed similar improvement at Cullen and Martin.
Some other schools joined Haas, Cullen and Martin in pushing reading in
every class, from language arts courses to math courses. The Student Learning
and Guidance Center, Baker Middle School and Hamlin Middle School also follow
the same philosophy, said Maria Goodloe,assistant superintendent for Instruction
and Special Programs.
Goodloe also said that the district hired and is utilizing consultants,
master teachers and staff developers to boost reading proficiency district-wide.
Melba Smithwick, a staff developer at Haas, said she pushes teachers to
keep up with the latest strategies in teaching to get kids up to speed.
Every student is expected to read and write in every class, read aloud with
teachers and discuss and analyze literature.
Three-year goal
"Our goal is to have 90 percent of our students read on grade level,"
Smithwick said. "We had a three-year goal. And next year is the third
year."
Smithwick said other staff developers include Tammy Gathright at Cullen,
Frank Rodriguez at Martin, and Raquel Coronado at Baker.
Smithwick said Lillian Villareal at Hamlin and Steven Groll at Martin would
move into the roles next year.
Like Smithwick, Carolyn Knolle McNeill, a language arts consultant at the
district, said she recognizes the need to stay on the cutting edge of teaching.
"We're doing everything we can to support then-Governor Bush's reading
initiative," McNeill said.
"We've been planning for several years because we know that next year
our third-graders will be held accountable with the new TAKS test."
Tougher test coming
Beginning in the 2002-2003 school year, third-graders who do not pass the
Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills test will not be promoted to the
fourth grade.
McNeill said she expects the more difficult test next year to produce lower
scores. But she added that as more teachers become familiar with how to
teach the skills that the exam tests, scores should rise again.
Besides the efforts of Haas and its sister schools, district administrators
put programs in at almost every grade level.
Pre-Kindergarten students use two early developmental literacy programs,
known as "Leap into Literacy" and "First Books."
Kindergarten, first-grade and second-grade students begin "Reading
Academies" and teachers begin screening for dyslexia.
Third- through fifth-graders in the special emphasis schools - including
elementary schools Oak Park, Lamar, Lozano, Coles, Los Encinos and Zavala
- learn skills through POWER, or "Promoting Outstanding Work through
Excellence in Reading."
Some middle and high school students, who are not on the literacy-focused
campuses, get early exposure to Advanced Placement materials that could
further increase reading levels and comprehension.
High-school focus
"In high school, they are more at maintenance level in reading,"
said consultant Karen Moorhead. "And so they are exposed to Advanced
Placement suggested novels and poetry, and teachers take the kids through
various time periods of American and British history. The focus at high
school is to expose students to as much as they can through novels and poetry
and essays and non-fiction."
Some district high school students even get computer assistance to better
reading skills.
"Our high schools offer what is called CEI, Creative Education Institute,"
Moorhead said. "It's a program that really targets struggling students
and helps them get on track."
Texas Assessment of Academic Skills scores indicate that the administrators'
efforts are working.
Scores at high schools
Scores from the reading portion of TAAS show King High School's scores steadily
improving from 82 percent in 1994 to 95 percent this year.
At Carroll High School reading scores went from 88 percent in 1994 to 97
percent this year.
Ray High School also improved. Reading scores went from 76 percent in 1994
to 94 percent this year.
Moody High School students mirrored the district's trend. Reading scores
went from 68 percent in 1994 to 92 percent this year.
But Miller High School showed the most dramatic improvement. Only 58 percent
of the students met the state's minimum reading requirements in 1994. This
year, 92 percent of the students passed.
Berta Cruz, mother of Haas student Cassy Gonzalez, said she sees the improvement
in the district's dedication to make better readers out of its students.
She said Cassy's development has surpassed that of her other daughter, who
went through the same schools without the same level of reading instruction.
"I'm really impressed with what's going on there," Cruz said of
Haas. "I can see how they motivate them so much."
==============================================
05-10-02
Corpus Christi Caller Times
Haas Foundation gives $12,000 each to 10 students
By Tim Eaton
The school band played Bach in the green-trimmed cafeteria as all 179 eighth
graders at Corpus Christi's Paul R. Haas Middle School walked away Thursday
with a set of new books, which included "The Hobbit" and "The
Lord of the Rings" trilogy.
But only 10 students left with a $12,000 scholarship for college.
The top-ten eighth graders in academics at Haas each accepted the scholarships
from the Paul and Mary Haas Foundation.
For Paul Haas, the retired oilman who is the school's namesake, and his
wife, this is the sixth year that they have donated the scholarships to
the school's top-performing students. They donated books for the past 28
years.
"I'm particularly interested in education in the lower levels because
people tend to take care of the kids in the upper levels and forget about
the lower levels," said Paul Haas, who has been a member of local and
state school boards. "We hope that other people will be interested
in this type of thing."
Mary Haas said that she and her husband donate the money to encourage young
students to continue reading and learning throughout middle school, high
school and beyond. The foundation only asks that the students stay in the
district for high school and be accepted to a college or vocational school.
The foundation, which has pledged $720,000 since 1997, gives the students
$1,500 per semester. The students from the first class to receive the scholarships
are now all enrolled in college, and the second class has all been accepted
to college and plan to attend in the fall.
Many of the Haas scholars attend school in Corpus Christi, but others go
to other schools, including the University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M
University at College Station and Baylor University.
Haas Principal Deborah Scates said that many of the scholarship winners
in past years would not have been able to afford college without the help
of Paul and Mary Haas.
That is also the case for some of the students this year.
One student, Chelsea Craig, lost her father nine years ago, and her mother
cannot work. Her brother dropped out of school to help support the family.
Her sister, an athlete with solid grades in high school, could not afford
college when she graduated, but she is now paying her way through Austin
Community College.
Chelsea's mother Jessie Sterling praised the Haas family for their kindness
and said that her daughter has always set high goals and achieved them
"It's nice to know that people, who don't even know our children, take
such an interest in them," Sterling said before the scholarship presentation.
"The Haases are there for our kids every year. They are just amazing
and generous people."
For many of the scholarship winners, Thursday's ceremony marks the point
where they can relax - though Mary Haas warned the students to continue
to keep up the long hours and hard work.
"It's kind of a big sigh of relief," said Chelsea. "It's
good to know that all this hard work paid off."
The winners had to maintain the highest academic standards throughout middle
school.
Michael and Coraletta Dellis, parents of Noranda Dellis, said that their
daughter has always been a conscientious student. But Michael Dellis added
that he sometimes reminded Noranda to keep focused on her grades and the
scholarship in the final months at Haas Middle School.
"We kept it in her mind this year," said Michael Dellis, a Texas
A&M graduate. He said it wouldn't bother him if she used her scholarship
to go the University of Texas .
==============================================
05-31-02
Chicago Sun-Times
Reading, Math Scores Climb
BY ROSALIND ROSSI
SUN-TIMES EDUCATION REPORTER
Based on a new test and a new national measuring stick, reading and math
scores this year hit their highest levels since Mayor Daley took over the
city's schools in 1995, officials said Thursday.
All nationally normed reading and math tests were solidly up, with math
hikes surpassing reading gains, even though reading got a $16 million boost
this year.
However, only 35.5 percent of high school students tested at the national
average in reading.
Schools CEO Arne Duncan and School Board President Michael Scott, both approaching
their first anniversaries, attributed the across-the-board gains to better
first-day attendance, a new reading initiative and 50,000 more students
in after-school programs.
"Everyone in Chicago can take a great deal of satisfaction in today's
news,'' Daley said at Kellogg School in Beverly, which posted an almost
10 percentage point reading gain.
"But there is much more to be done. As you know, I'm never satisfied
or happy. We cannot let up for a minute.''
For the first time in years, Chicago public schoolchildren this May were
given a new form of the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills and its high school equivalent.
Results were tied to a new representative pool of the nation's children,
or "norming sample.'' The new sample group also took the old Iowa tests,
allowing officials to recalculate, or "renorm,'' old scores onto the
new measuring stick.
Elementary reading scores rose to 43.2 percent, at or above the national
norm. Elementary math scores jumped to 46.9 percent, nearing the 50 percent
national norm.
High school reading scores climbed to 35.5 percent, barely above their 2000
levels after a large drop last year.
In elementary reading, the new measuring stick gave Chicago a boost because
the new national sample group was weaker in reading than the old one, creating
a lower national norm. Asked if he was using a new measuring rod to make
scores look better, Daley said, "No one is trying to commit fraud or
make everybody look good. No way. . . . If you phony anything up, you're
just cheating children. Why would I want to do that?''
Duncan said the system had been "roundly criticized'' for using three
variations of the same test for years and pinning the results to a 14-year-old
norming sample. Some critics had charged this encouraged "teaching
to the test'' and inflated gains.
"We renormed all the [tests] . . . so it's an absolutely fair comparison,''
Duncan said.
Monty Neill of FairTest, a watchdog group, said "it could be right,
but it looks strange'' that in some years, elementary reading gains were
bigger using old norms, and in other years, the gains were bigger using
the new norms.
Test author Steve Dunbar of the University of Iowa said the differences
could be due to different forms of the old test.
Reading scores increased in 72 percent of elementary schools and 63 percent
of general high schools. Math improved in 74 percent of elementary schools,
but no comparison was available for high schools.
Finally, more than half of eighth-graders were reading at or above national
norms. Seventh-grade math scores also surpassed the midpoint.
Math increased in all grades, and reading increased in third, fourth, seventh
and eighth grades but declined in fifth and sixth.
The steeper rises in math than reading, despite a new reading initiative,
may have more to do with an unusually large drop in math scores last year,
when a harder form of the old test was used, said Chicago school researcher
Fred Hess of Northwestern University.
==============================================
05-31-02
Chicago Sun-Times
Many low-performing schools show reading gains
BY KATE N. GROSSMAN
STAFF REPORTER
The rise in reading scores at 114 of Chicago's lowest-performing elementary
schools reverses a three-year decline, offering some support for the school
district's much-touted Reading Initiative.
At those schools, each with a reading specialist this year, 26.3 percent
of students met or exceeded national norms, up from 23.6 percent last year,
scores released Thursday show. About 74 percent of the schools showed improvement.
The increase was slightly below the reading improvement citywide.
"It's not enough to turn these kids around yet, but it's positive,"
said Tim Shanahan, director of the $16 million initiative launched last
summer by schools CEO Arne Duncan. It's the centerpiece program of his first
year at the helm.
Shanahan and most reading specialists say it's too early to judge the program,
a citywide effort to improve how reading is taught. Individual school scores
aren't available, and these schools still are far behind city averages.
Shanahan and the others also know how much work is left to do. The specialists
have traded the task of teaching kids for the often far thornier one of
teaching adults.
"Some people aren't even accepting our presence, so it's like beating
your head against a brick wall when you have something to give and they
don't even want to accept it," said reading specialist Willie Legardy,
reflecting on complaints from colleagues.
The specialists are the heart of the Reading Initiative, which requires
schools to teach reading two to three hours a day and lays out plans for
teaching reading, and includes money for books and training.
Many specialists have been embraced by their schools, including Legardy
at Burke. For others, dispatched to the schools in October or November,
it has been a rough road.
Leery teachers. Blank stares. Closed doors.
That is some of what reading specialist Denise Sherrod-Hurley found at Gillespie
School on the Far South Side.
"We thought [Sherrod-Hurley] was coming in with a checklist, to tell
on us," said Sandra Duke, a first-grade teacher. "We're so used
to having people evaluate us, and then she says she's here to help. We say,
'We're not so sure about that.' "
Bit by bit, Sherrod-Hurley, a no-nonsense veteran educator, began winning
over teachers.
She created a reading resource room, strategies for teachers and tips for
parents. She offered workshops each Thursday and held one-on-one coaching
sessions.
"I needed some inspiration, and she was it," said Michelle Patterson,
a second-grade teacher. "I was sort of at a boredom level with my teaching."
But Sherrod-Hurley hasn't won the battle yet. Like many reading specialists,
she struggles with a staff unaccustomed to collaborating and a school schedule
with little room for training.
"The teachers have had an opportunity to see that I'm here for one
reason--to help support reading," Sherrod-Hurley said. "We still
have a long ways to go, but if we just stay focused on the children, as
time goes on we'll see the improvements."
==============================================
06-02-02
Raleigh News & Observer
New U.S. standards perplex N.C. schools
Education plan aims to close achievement gap
By TIM SIMMONS, Staff Writer
Ever since North Carolina began grading its schools in 1996, Seawell Elementary
School in Chapel Hill has hauled in one honor after another. Almost 90 percent
of its 690 students score at grade level or higher on standardized exams.
But Seawell is failing its students academically, according to tough new
federal standards. So is every other elementary and middle school in the
Chapel Hill-Carrboro school district. In the Triangle, 75 percent of all
elementary and middle schools fall short, according to a state analysis.
The reason boils down to a single phrase: the achievement gap.
As part of the No Child Left Behind Act, the centerpiece of President Bush's
education agenda, all schools must make measurable progress in closing the
gap among students of various income and racial groups. At Seawell, African-American
students, low-income students and those in special education did not make
the progress expected of them. Those shortcomings meant the entire school
failed to meet the standard.
Seawell was hardly alone in its rating. Only 27 percent of the state's 1,731
elementary and middle schools meet the new federal requirements, according
to the state's analysis of spring 2001 test scores. Even among schools honored
for "exemplary growth" under the state ABCs program, only 51 percent
pass the federal test.
It's not that the tests are harder. The federal results are based on the
same end-of-grade exams that North Carolina uses for the ABCs of Public
Education. But the ABCs rewards schools for the average test scores of all
students, even when low-income and minority students are lagging. The federal
model penalizes a school if even one group of students falls behind.
"I shudder to think what people are going to say when they see this,"
said Neil Pedersen, Chapel Hill-Carrboro schools superintendent. "It
is so inflexible. If any group of kids fails to meet the standard, the whole
school is labeled as failing. Still, I would have thought at least one school
in our district would meet the mark."
North Carolina is the only state than can produce such a detailed review
of the federal standards because it tracks the test results for every group
of students defined in the new legislation, including six different ethnic
groups, children with disabilities and those who speak limited English.
This year's results, which are startling educators, are meant only to inform
schools. But next year, when the federal standard takes effect, the new
law could affect everything from a school's reputation to its bonus pay
for teachers.
Left unanswered is how the new requirements will affect parents and students,
partly because local schools are just now learning details of the new law.
Schools rated as failing two years in a row could face federal sanctions
under the law that gives parents the right to demand transfers for their
children. Parents can also demand free tutoring at the school district's
expense if the school fails to meet the standard three consecutive years.
Local educators have no idea how many parents will take advantage of those
rights, but some predict it won't be long until the standards force changes
in the classroom.
"This change is coming, and it is poorly understood by a lot of people,
including school principals," said Jim Causby, Johnston County schools
superintendent. "When it is understood, I expect it will force us to
pay attention to kids who, to be honest, haven't had enough attention in
the past. It could be painful for schools that are used to doing well under
the ABCs."
In Johnston County, where the district typically scores well, more than
80 percent of the schools would have failed to meet the federal standards
if they were in effect last year. In Durham, more than 90 percent would
have failed. In Wake and Orange counties, more than 60 percent.
Adequate progress
The federal standards are defined under the deceptively simple name "Adequate
Yearly Progress." Deciphering the intent of those definitions reveals
a fundamental shift in federal education policy.
As written, No Child Left Behind expects schools to close all achievement
gaps in 12 years. It's a huge expectation given the size of the gap that
divides many white and middle class students from those who are poor, minority
or enrolled in special education.
In most North Carolina school districts, the numbers of white and Asian
students at grade level exceed 80 percent.
The passing rates for students who are black, Hispanic or poor is often
below 60 percent.
Until now, Congress has required states simply to track academic progress
in general. Now, the law requires that every school be held individually
accountable for the progress of all students.
If any group fails to meet the standard of Adequate Yearly Progress, the
entire school fails. Schools can have as many as 10 separate groups under
the law, and each group is measured in both reading and math, for a potential
total of 20 separate academic goals.
"We could argue about whether this is fair, but it's a wasted argument,"
said Wake County schools Superintendent Bill McNeal. "At the end of
the day, we are responsible for every child. Will we do it? Certainly. Will
we look good early on? I doubt it."
Second chances
On the eastern edge of Chapel Hill, Seawell Elementary is reasonably diverse
by North Carolina standards. More than half of the students are white, but
almost a quarter are black, and one of every every five is Asian. Significant
numbers are enrolled in special education or qualify for subsidized lunches.
For the purposes of measuring Adequate Yearly Progress, all five groups
must score at grade level on the state's end-of-grade exams in reading and
math. The law also creates a sixth group --the school as whole --which captures
every test score even when a group of students fails to meet the required
minimum of 30 members.
A close look at Seawell's test scores illustrates the thin line that can
divide success from failure.
Using a complex formula, the No Child Left Behind Act requires about 75
percent of the students in each group pass their end-of-grade reading and
math tests. The performance bars are periodically raised over time to encourage
improvement.
Seawell's white and Asian students easily cleared the federal performance
bar for both math and reading, with passing rates of almost 100 percent.
Students who were poor, black or with disabilities fell short of the bar.
But the law also gives schools a second chance: It encourages them to keep
working with failing students with a "safe harbor" provision that
recognizes significant improvement. If the number of students who fail the
test shrinks by at least 10 percent from one year to the next, then this
group also is considered to be making Adequate Yearly Progress.
The rule would have helped Seawell Elementary School a bit last year. Under
the "safe harbor" provision, Seawell's black and low-income students
exceeded their improvement targets and met the federal standard for reading,
but not for math. Seawell's disabled students fell short of both the reading
and math standards.
In several cases, the test results of just one or two students made the
difference between meeting the federal standard or failing.
Seawell Principal Deshera Mack asked how a standard with such a thin margin
for error will help parents understand whether her school is helping their
child. But, like other principals, she seemed resigned to the arrival of
the new law.
"First you take a breath and give yourself some time to think about
it," Mack said. "Then you pick yourself up by your bootstraps
and say, 'Let's go.' This is public education today."
Problems with ABCs
The ABCs of Public Education has had its problems since it was introduced
in North Carolina, but it's still considered one of the most sophisticated
programs in the nation. Its history gives the state a key voice in the debate
over how to apply the new federal standards.
In a cubicle that opens to a bank of windows overlooking the state's government
complex, Gongshu Zhang is the person who gives that voice much of its authority.
Zhang is not a teacher, but a physicist who does much of the test analysis
for the state's accountability programs. He has found himself shaping opinions
while giving presentations on the new standards to audiences throughout
the nation. But he prefers to watch policy unfold while he analyzes data
and interprets the results.
Looking at Durham, he can see that the performance of poor students and
those with disabilities is the main reason more than 90 percent of the schools
failed to meet the federal standard. But in several Durham schools, white
children were the only ones making Adequate Yearly Progress.
In Wake County, 36 percent of the schools met the standard, but those that
did best were the ones that lacked diversity. The same was true in Johnston
County.
In every district, there is little incentive under the federal law for schools
to push students harder once they reach grade level.
And because most white and Asian students easily meet the federal standards
in most schools, it could be a decade before those students are challenged
by the small but regular increases in the minimum performance bar.
"It is very hard to build an accountability model that brings up your
lowest students and still challenges your brightest ones," Zhang said.
"It is very hard."
'Fairly good shape'
Barbara Chapman is principal of New Hope Elementary, an Orange County school
that would have met the federal standards last year. But she isn't sure
she is all that impressed with her school's rating. She isn't even convinced
that schools are supposed to succeed in light of the new standards.
"Look, we are told we'll be held accountable next year under this program,
but we haven't even seen the rules of the game yet," Chapman said.
Chapman's point has been made repeatedly to federal officials, who don't
expect to approve the law's final regulations until sometime this summer.
But Mike Ward, the state schools superintendent, said the Bush administration
has made clear that it will not delay the program even though many states
predict passing rates far below North Carolina's.
"The irony is that we are in fairly good shape compared to other states,"
Ward said. "But I don't see federal officials backing off, even if
states have fewer than 10 percent of their schools meeting the standard.
"The bottom line is this: How can you argue that it's all right to
leave some children behind at the expense of others? You can't. That's why
this program is going to be here for a while."
==============================================
06-03-02
Columbus Dispatch
Schools making tutoring mandatory
Ruth E. Sternberg
Dispatch Schools Reporter
If you can show up for football practice, you can show up for academic practice.
That's the message administrators in the Groveport Madison and Pickerington
school districts are sending students who haven't passed the state's high-school
proficiency tests.
Both districts are saying that if students fail even one of the five sections
of the ninth-grade test, they must attend tutoring sessions.
If they don't, they can't participate in activities such as football, chess
club or the speech team.
The rule is designed to get students to attend help sessions -- a problem
many educators say they have been battling for years.
"Our students found time to make it to the athletics fields, but they
couldn't make it to this,'' said Martha England, curriculum director in
Pickerington.
"We're trying to make sure that these kids entering high school have
every advantage they can,'' said Mike Beck, principal of Groveport Middle
School South. With this mandate, he said, "It does have a little more
clout.''
Some fellow school administrators acknowledge the problem and say the rule
is a good idea.
"We might do that next year,'' said Ed Johnson, principal of East High
School.
In Pickerington, the 6-year-old penalty kicks in for sophomores who have
tried repeatedly to pass but don't. In Groveport, the new policy means anyone
in grades eight through 12 who still hasn't passed must attend the sessions
to keep participating.
Groveport students are giving the rule mixed reviews. Letters went home
telling parents they have until Friday to enroll their children in the five-day
tutoring session in July.
Eighth-grader Lisa Johnson, who attends Middle School South, isn't happy
she is one of 132 eighth- graders who received notices -- though Beck was
unable to say how many are involved in extracurricular activities. About
240 took the ninth-grade test in the spring.
Johnson failed the math and science sections, and she wants to retain her
place as lead trumpet player in the band. Yet the tutoring interrupts her
preparations for the county fair and her swimming activities.
"I don't think it's right. All my life I have passed every single class,''
she said. "I've mostly been on honor roll. I'm easily going into the
ninth grade. Just because I didn't pass two parts and don't want to take
the tutoring, that should not hold me back.''
Her mother agrees.
"They keep pushing and pushing and pushing,'' Amy Johnson said.
She said it will be difficult to get her daughter to the tutoring sessions,
and she hopes the district will live up to its promise to provide a bus.
"Not everybody's going to be able to get their kids there, even if
it's a one-week deal,'' she said. Last year, "My son was having academic
problems and they wanted him to go to summer school. We didn't send him.''
South eighth-grader Mark Daniels -- a football player -- said he was nervous
about what he would have to do after learning he didn't pass the math test
by seven points.
"Throughout the whole entire school year they were telling me about
this,'' he said. "I've heard you have to pass five out of five (parts)
or three out of five. It was just a mess.''
He isn't bothered about attending the tutoring.
"It's only for like a week, so that's no big deal,'' he said.
Classmate Chelsea Atkins, a cheerleader, said she figures it's good to get
the proficiency test out of the way early. She didn't pass the science section.
"I wasn't happy. It's my summer, and you have to do it (tutoring) during
your time off,'' she said.
But "after I thought about having it (the ninth-grade test) over with,
I didn't really mind.''
==============================================
06-03-02
Los Angeles Times
Sex Education: What's Taught, What's Not
By BENEDICT CAREY, TIMES STAFF WRITER
With church scandals, Internet porn and teenage romance, sex education could
be one of the most wide-ranging and important subjects taught in middle
and high school, some child psychologists say. Yet for better or worse,
most of the nation's sex-ed classes focus on a handful of subjects--including
anatomy, abstinence, AIDS--and offer little guidance to boys and girls trying
to cope with a host of physical and emotional changes.
Though approaches vary from school to school, most start with what some
educators call "fifth-grade plumbing," a quick explanation of
where babies come from, said Tamara Kreinin, president of the Sexuality
Information and Education Council of the United States, a New York-based
nonprofit organization that works with schools and parents.
In middle school and beyond, Kreinin said, many students get a smattering
of courses, some on sexually transmitted diseases, others on the importance
of avoiding sex. "Sometimes the course amounts to being shown an hourlong
movie, without any discussion afterward," she said.
Many teachers shy away from edgier topics such as sexual abuse, harassment
and date rape--or how, for example, a 13-year-old might handle sexual involvement
with someone 10 years older. "Teachers will tell you, 'We wouldn't
touch those subjects with a 10-foot pole; the parents would go nuts,'"
said Sal Chiariello, who runs an innovative sex and development education
program in Rockland County, N.Y., for kindergarten through 12th grade.
"There's a lot of apprehension when it comes to this stuff. Teachers
are worried about losing tenure, the administrators are afraid of the parents,
and parents fear for what their kids might be learning."
In this environment, a discussion of sexuality or relationships with older
peers or adults would probably be disastrous, he said. "Even in 12th
grade, there are kids with very mature bodies who have no concept of consent
... and believe me, in a large high school with thousands of kids, there
are going to be some predators who are watching to see which ones are vulnerable."
For now, administrators say, political debate over whether to teach contraception
has precluded many educators from including the topics teenagers most want
to learn about--such as how to manage erotic urges, relationships and pressure
to have sex. "Right now, we're having an argument over whether we should
even mention condoms in the classroom," said Tina Hoff, vice president
at the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit health research group in Menlo
Park, Calif. "We're not even close to a discussion about giving kids
skills to negotiate whether or not to have sex."
That's as it should be, millions of parents say: Schools have no place giving
advice about sexual behavior, beyond describing the benefits of abstinence.
Some policymakers agree. In recent years, the federal government has set
aside some $400 million to support programs that teach abstinence until
marriage. Nationwide, about 34% of high schools teach abstinence-only curricula,
downplaying or omitting discussion of contraception, according to a 1999
Kaiser Foundation survey. Another 58% of schools in the survey reported
teaching comprehensive courses, which include discussions of contraception.
When asked what they want their kids to learn in sex education, parents
are generally more demanding than teachers. In a 2000 Kaiser survey, more
than eight in 10 parents of teenagers nationwide said schools should teach
students how to use condoms, as well as other contraceptives, and how to
talk about protection with partners. About three-quarters said that sex-ed
classes should discuss sexual orientation and abortion. Almost all of the
parents surveyed wanted schools to help their kids handle the pressure to
have sex, and the emotional consequences of becoming sexually active.
"The parents themselves sure aren't doing it," said Hoff. "So
many kids are getting their sex education from other sources, from the media,
from the WB network and MTV. I think even network executives would agree
those aren't the best sources."
California requires school districts to cover a number of topics related
to sex, including contraception and pregnancy. Students typically get two
to five weeks of classes, first in the seventh grade, and again in 10th
grade, said Ric Loya, of the HIV/AIDS prevention unit of the Los Angeles
Unified School District. "These are the highest-attended classes of
the year," said Loya. "The kids are just packed in, even if the
teacher is boring."
Though most teachers stick closely to the curriculum, Loya said, all get
questions from students on everything from how to recognize sexual advances
to how to handle their boyfriend's moods. "Sometimes they raise their
hand in class, sometimes they'll come up to you afterward, but that's how
many things are handled--informally," he said.
==============================================
06-01-02
Quincy (MA) Patriot Ledger
Student ecologists experience nature: New school club ends busy year
By JEFFREY WHITE
The Patriot Ledger
SCITUATE - Scituate seventh-grader Joe Maskell stood on a wind-swept beach
Friday and looked through a telescope.
He watched as a piping plover, a shorebird that looks like a snowball on
stilts, skittered back and forth in front of her nest.
''This is hands-on experience,'' he said. ''It's fun to actually see the
environment from the environment, and not in a book.''
That's why Jean Chambers started the Gates Intermediate School Environmental
Club earlier this year. She wanted to give students the chance to learn
about the natural world by getting out of the classroom.
''The students have a lot of commitments outside of school, so I'm pretty
amazed that we can get a good core group each time,'' said Chambers, who
is an earth science teacher at the school.
The group has been very active in recent months, thanks to a $2,500 ''Outdoor
Classroom'' grant from the state's Office of Environmental Affairs.
That grant, and a partnership Chambers has formed with Scituate's First
Herring Brook Watershed Initiative, has taken sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders
on several field trips this spring.
The field trips ''have been centered around watershed issues,'' Chambers
said. ''They're learning about living in a watershed, what lives there and
how to protect the surrounding ecosystem.''
Students have toured the town's wastewater treatment plant, studied vernal
pools and tested water quality at various streams. They have also taken
a guided tour by an entomologist active in the Scituate watershed group.
The club has spearheaded an effort to plant what students call a colonial
garden at Scituate's historic Cudworth House.
Friday, 15 students searched for coastal birds in a cool wind on a sand
spit off Third Cliff. The piping plover, which state environmental officials
say is a threatened species, nested near the dunes of the beach.
Overhead, least terns swooped and darted.
Gary Van Wart, a naturalist active in the watershed group, joined several
members of the Massachusetts Audubon Society and lectured students on the
habits of coastal birds.
Students, wielding nets on long polls, also took samples of invertebrate
life from several tidal pools.
''This has been a really fun experience,'' Joe Maskell said, referring to
the activities the environmental club has participated in this year.
Friday's outing with the environmental club kicked off Biodiversity Days
in Scituate, which is being run by the watershed group.
Throughout the weekend, the public is invited to take part in four different
explorations of Scituate wildlife. Each is led by environmental specialists.
Biodiversity Days are part of a statewide effort to identify native plant
and animal species.
Activities include:
-A walk through Driftway Park with ecologist Andy Walsh and geologist Sandie
Kelly, starting at 9 a.m. Saturday.
- A ''Wild West Nature Walk'' along the extensive land of the Maxwell Conservation
Trust with Walsh and naturalist Gary Van Wart, starting at 1 p.m Saturday.
-Bird watching along the Glades with Linda Bornstein of Massachusetts Audubon
Society, starting at 9 a.m. Sunday.
-A nature walk through the Ellis Estate with Van Wart and herbalist Susan
Leigh Anthony, starting at 1 p.m. Sunday.
All in town are invited to the Biodiversity Days barbecue at 4:30 p.m. Sunday
at the Driftway Park picnic area. The barbecue will celebrate the watershed
group's second birthday.
==============================================
June 9, 2002
Hartford Courant
Too Many Schools To Be Left Behind?
Educators: New Law Raises Bar Too High
By ROBERT A. FRAHM,
Courant Staff Writer
The standards in President Bush's new education law are so demanding that
educators believe thousands of schools across the nation - the overwhelming
majority in some states - could be labeled as failing.
Even in states such as Connecticut and North Carolina, where public schools
are considered among the best in the nation, officials predict that vast
numbers of schools will fall short of targets under the federal No Child
Left Behind Act.
Although officials have praised the law's intent to improve academic performance,
some worry that it will single out far too many schools for intervention.
In North Carolina, an analysis of current test scores projects that more
than 70 percent of schools would not meet annual yearly progress goals.
In Connecticut, as many as three out of four public schools could fall short
over the next two years, says a report to be handed to the state Board of
Education this week.
That includes schools in some of the state's most affluent and academically
successful school systems, from West Hartford to Greenwich.
What makes the law particularly tough, educators say, is that a school can
be singled out for intervention if even one group of students - such as
racial minorities, low-income children, limited-English speakers or special
education students - fails to make sufficient yearly gains on annual statewide
tests.
Schools that repeatedly fail to meet the goals over several years can be
ordered to take corrective steps - such as allowing students to attend other
schools, offering private tutoring, replacing teachers or even submitting
to total state control.
The prospect of high failure rates has raised alarms as states and local
districts begin to get ready for one of the most sweeping education reforms
ever enacted by Congress.
"To take one of the highest-performing states in the country and say
within two years that three-quarters of the schools are failing shows how
ridiculous these standards are," said David Larson, executive director
of the Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents. "They
have to be fixed."
The law, signed in January by President Bush with broad support among Republicans
and Democrats, is patterned after some of the reforms in Bush's home state
of Texas.
"There is a sense of national urgency. We need to be serious and dramatic
about improving America's schools," said U.S. Undersecretary of Education
Gene Hickok. "That's what this law is all about - raising the bar."
Educators are still trying to sort out the nuances in the law's 1,200-plus
pages, but some believe the standards will be impossible to attain.
"The Texas accountability model on steroids," a Connecticut education
department researcher wrote in a professional newsletter to colleagues from
around the nation.
The goal is to have all groups of students in all schools meet the standards
within 12 years, but experts wonder whether states will have the capacity
to assist large numbers of failing schools.
"It's hard to make something a priority for improvement when it's such
a large number," said Connecticut Education Commissioner Theodore S.
Sergi, who, along with commissioners from North Carolina, Massachusetts,
Tennessee and Arkansas, met with Bush last month to discuss the new law.
Educators are particularly skeptical that schools can close the gap as quickly
as the law demands for low-performing groups, especially special education
students and those who speak little or no English.
"Saying those two subgroups will each be at 100 percent proficiency
in 12 years is unreasonable," said Bob Harmon, an assistant superintendent
with the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction in the state
of Washington.
State officials there analyzed current test scores and estimated that anywhere
from 35 percent to 74 percent of Washington's public schools could fall
below standard.
Hickok, the U.S. education department undersecretary, said, "We're
hearing those concerns from a number of states." He said it may be
premature to estimate the number of failing schools until the department
issues more specific guidelines within the next month or two, but added
there may be a significant number that have pockets of low performance.
"The whole purpose of No Child Left Behind is to expose those achievement
gaps and do something about it," he said.
The federal act makes improving the performance of minority groups an important
goal, but setting test score targets for minority groups will not work,
University of California at Los Angeles Professor Thomas J. Kane and Dartmouth
College Professor Douglas O. Steiger say in a paper to be presented at Harvard
University this week.
Instead, the law is likely to penalize schools with large minority groups,
the professors say.
"The vast majority of schools containing substantial African-American
or Latino [populations] will end up failing," Kane said.
Michael E. Ward, state school superintendent in North Carolina, praised
the federal law for "providing greater impetus for closing [achievement]
gaps than any policy move I've seen," but he added that the identification
of large numbers of failing schools - as many as 70 percent in his state
- could be counterproductive.
"The numbers are so overwhelmingly negative. . .folks may say, `What's
the point?' " he said.
In Connecticut, Sergi, too, has been an outspoken advocate of closing the
achievement gap but says Congress and the U.S. Department of Education,
faced with long lists of failing schools, "either have to make some
amendments in the act or write creatively in the regulations."
The consequences for failing schools could kick in as early as this fall
in states that already have identified low-performing schools under previous
laws.
One of the dilemmas officials face is setting a proficiency standard - something
each state is allowed to establish independently. Too high, and nearly all
schools will fail. Too low, and the mark will be meaningless.
Connecticut will continue to report annually on how schools perform on a
"mastery" goal on the statewide Mastery Test, but officials also
are proposing to establish a separate "proficiency" goal - a lower
standard - one "that is realistically attainable by 100 percent of
Connecticut's students" by 2014, as required in the federal law, says
a report to the state Board of Education. The board is expected to vote
on the new standard this week.
In Massachusetts, officials will maintain a rigorous proficiency standard
even though "everyone understands we will not get to 100 percent,"
said Juliane Dow, an associate commissioner with the Massachusetts Department
of Education. "But our view ... is we can come a whole lot closer than
we are now."
The No Child Left Behind Act includes a broad range of reforms, such as
requiring every state to test all third- through eighth-graders in reading
and math by 2005-06.
"I think it's an admirable concept," said Rosemary Coyle, president
of the Connecticut Education Association teachers' union, "but it's
not based in reality. When you're going to identify 75 percent of the schools
in the state [as failures]. . .what kind of message is that?"
Requiring every group of students in every school to be 100 percent proficient
within 12 years, Coyle said, "is like asking every kid to jump the
Grand Canyon."
==============================================
June 11, 2002
Baltimore Sun
Aim to leave none behind
Lombard: The middle school's success in helping pupils pass the math test
required to enter high school is adding up.
By Erika Niedowski
Sun Staff
Last of a series of occasional articles about an ambitious plan to transform
a failing Baltimore school.
Eighth-grader Janay Castle has taken the practice Maryland Functional Math
Test at least four times on this day from her seat in the computer lab at
Baltimore's Lombard Middle School. Twice, she passed. Twice, she didn't.
Now, she has decided to take the exam once more -- this time, for real.
"You sure?" asks Michael Smith, one of two eighth-grade math teachers
at Lombard who have been spearheading an end-of-year push to raise the pass
rate on the mandatory state exam. "I'm not trying to make you nervous."
"I'm already nervous," the 13-year-old replies. "You can't
make me more nervous."
Janay is one of the nearly 230 pupils in the eighth-grade class at Lombard,
a struggling middle school east of downtown that is nearing the end of its
first year in a fast-track reform program.
Like their peers across the city, the school's eighth-graders are perched
on the edge of an academic precipice: Only 77 -- about a third -- have met
all of the new requirements needed for promotion to high school, Lombard
Principal Gwendola Taliaferro said yesterday. The rest are headed to the
system's largest-ever summer school, their final chance to catch up.
As bad as the promotion numbers seem, Taliaferro says many pupils are improving
steadily, even if they're not where they should be. "They were so far
behind," she says.
To enter the ninth grade, pupils have to pass functional tests in reading,
writing and math. They have to pass all of their classes. And, for the first
time, they have to get a minimum score on a national standardized test.
Citywide, as many as 4,000 to 5,000 of the school system's 7,000 eighth-graders
are in danger of being held back.
In February, shortly after the city school board passed a tougher version
of the promotion policy, Taliaferro called an impromptu meeting of eighth-graders
and their teachers in the cafeteria at which everyone got a copy of the
requirements.
Some pupils listened and some didn't as she tried to impress upon them the
importance of the white piece of paper in front of them.
If they passed their classes and did well on their tests, she explained,
they would stay at Lombard for only four more months before crossing the
bridge to high school. If they didn't, they would remain at Lombard for
another year.
"Please don't make me say that to you," Taliaferro said, referring
to the second option. "Please, you have every opportunity in the world
to do well. It is on you."
A team effort
In the final weeks of classes, Smith and the rest of the eighth-grade staff
-- no matter what they were teaching -- have teamed to stage something of
a functional math marathon. Taliaferro, a former math teacher, calls it
a "math-a-thon."
Children are given math drills in science. They are given math drills in
social studies. And, for more than an hour a day, some are pulled out of
their regular classes to practice the math skills they need to score at
least a 340 on the functional test -- which is designed to measure basic
competency and is considered a sixth grade-level test.
Smith says that, generally, the most troublesome areas are fractions, measurement
and word problems.
"Some of these kids, they just never got the foundation," he says.
"[The test] is just a major mountain for them to climb."
'It's important to me'
Wanda Chester, 14, normally would be in language arts, but she comes instead
to the functional tutorial session. She takes the computerized practice
version six times today and racks up scores of 301, 347, 357, 357, 333 and
347.
"It's important to me so I can get out of the eighth grade and not
have to go to summer school," she says.
Wanda zips through the computer test's 30 problems, which makes Smith a
little uneasy. Some pupils have taken the practice exam so many times that
they memorize the answers. That's why Smith also administers a paper version
to mix things up.
Wanda makes a mistake renaming one-tenth as a percent -- she put down 100
percent rather than 10 percent -- so Smith stops her immediately to deconstruct
the error.
A few days later, the effort pays off: She scores a 340, exactly what she
needs to pass.
Some of the pupils have failed the functional test four or more times, in
sixth grade, then seventh grade, then again in eighth grade, which Smith
says can leave them frustrated and discouraged. Once they do succeed, it's
an awfully big deal.
"It's almost as if the child has passed the bar exam or the CPA exam,"
says Smith. "It's a real self-esteem booster."
Even if they pass the math functional test, though, some children still
will have to attend summer school because they have not fulfilled other
requirements. The five-week summer session, which will begin June 24, will
be the district's largest ever, with anywhere from a third to half of the
system's 93,000 students eligible to attend.
Some mixed feelings
Taliaferro, who is in her second year heading Lombard, has mixed feelings
about the tougher promotion policy, which could drastically change the makeup
of her school.
The benefit, she says, is that pupils are taking their studies more seriously
because they understand the consequences if they don't. For years, students
were passed to the next grade no matter how they performed.
"My children are serious about it. There are a lot of heart attacks,"
Taliaferro says. "They are really taking everything they do seriously
now -- towards education."
On the other hand, Taliaferro wonders whether it is fair to require children
who have been so far behind for so long to be up to speed all of a sudden.
What about the ones who started the year reading or writing at a second-
or third-grade level and made up several grades, but are still not where
they should be?
"What do you do? Because they are making progress," she says.
Of the 197 eighth-graders who took the math functional test in October,
17 passed, says Zandra Stone-El, Lombard's department head for math. Since
then, about 100 more have done so.
The final hurdle
Janay is further ahead than many of her peers at Lombard. She has only the
math functional test to pass to ensure her promotion to high school.
She sits nervously in the computer lab trying not to psych herself out as
she waits to begin the official test. She has taken the practice version
dozens of times. On this day, she has twice scored 339 -- one point shy
of passing -- and twice scored 346.
"I pray I pass the real one," she says. "I got butterflies.
I want to pass this test so bad."
For the next 40 minutes, Janay works diligently at her computer, asking
once for an extra piece of scrap paper to work out her answers by hand.
When she is done, she raises her hand to summon Stone-El, the official keeper
of the scores.
Janay doesn't want to see the score that will be displayed immediately on
the screen, so she gets up from her seat and scoots to the other side of
the room.
"I'm scared," she says.
And then she sees the number: 341.
She has passed by one point.
She and Stone-El hug. The smiles on their faces are as genuine as you'll
ever find.
"See what hard work does?" says Stone-El.
Janay is on her way to high school. At Lombard, there are just 150 eighth-graders
to go.
==============================================
06-03-02
Long Beach Press-Telegram
KIDS WORK THE STREET IN P-T STOCK CONTEST
EDUCATION: CLASS AT ST. CORNELIUS SCHOOL RINGS UP HIGHEST `PROFIT' IN INVESTMENT
GAME.
John W. Cox
Staff writer
When Patrick Fitzgerald talks, the other kids in his seventh-grade math
class listen.
It was Fitzgerald, after all, who while reading the newspaper one day stumbled
upon Quest Diagnostics, the New Jersey medical testing company that won
his class first place in the Press-Telegram's annual stock market competition.
What caught Fitzgerald's eye was Quest's AIDS tests and other products the
company uses to detect diseases. Like the highly paid stock analysts at
Salomon Smith Barney and Credit Suisse First Boston, Fitzgerald saw big
money in the company's focus on specialized medical screening.
``He was really into this medical business,'' said Karen Vasquez, Fitzgerald's
math teacher at St. Cornelius School in Long Beach.
The company's stock did well in an in-class practice competition, so Fitzgerald's
class selected it as one of their two ``purchases'' for the annual newspaper
competition.
On March 7, the class bought 136 imaginary Quest shares at $73.30 each.
When they sold eight weeks later at the appointed ``sell date,'' the stock
was trading at $94.75.
Together with the class' small loss on AT&T Wireless stock, the class
grossed $2,916.63 on a hypothetical investment of about $10,000. That was
$1,721.44 better than the more diversified secondplace entry from teacher
Mike Trutanich's sixth-grade class at Wilmington Middle School in Wilmington.
Third place went to another Wilmington Middle School class, Dean Thornblad's
sixth-graders, which grossed $1,093.23.
Fitzgerald managed to remain humble, even though his stock pick increased
in value by about 30 percent over the same period that the Standard &
Poor's 500-stock index declined by almost 7 percent.
``My grades aren't the best, but my class still chose my stock,'' he said.
``And I feel good that my stock and school won.''
A note to all you adults out there: Don't try this at home. Take it from
Bill Nieland, now an 11-time winner of the newspaper's stock game.
``What we're doing is playing a game,'' said Nieland, whose 10ththrough
12th-grade sports and entertainment marketing class won first this year
for Wilson Classical High School. ``The game is an unreal situation because
we have no concern about preserving our initial $10,000 investment.''
Nieland advised his class to take imaginary money and do what he would never
do with real money: Bet it all on one company.
First there was a good deal of technical analysis to be done, an approach
Nieland learned from his finance professor in college. Aided by the Internet,
the winning Wilson class looked for a company whose stock price was undervalued,
one that looked like it was down only temporarily, just waiting to get back
up again.
Callon Petroleum was the deal they were looking for.
For about a year, investors had been worrying that Callon, a Mississippi-based
oil and natural gas company, wouldn't be able to pay for its deepwater development
project, according to a report by stock analysts at JP Morgan Chase H&Q.
But the analysts at JP Morgan decided that Callon's money problems weren't
as serious as had been feared.
Eight days after Nieland's class signed up for 2,500 shares of Callon Petroleum
at $4 apiece, the investment firm advised its clients to buy, too.
Word quickly got around about JP Morgan's investment recommendation, and
Callon's stock skyrocketed. Soon the class's hypothetical stock was worth
more than twice what they had paid.
But it lost much of that value by ``sell day,'' coming in at $6.10. Still,
the class scored a $5,250 profit, well ahead of David Lagerson's ninth-
through 12th-grade class at Regency High in Long Beach, which came in second
at $3,567.47. Nieland's other 10ththrough 12th-grade class got third place.
Callon Petroleum showed up on another first-place entry in this year's stock
game, the one turned in by Chris Burnett's fifth-grade class at Lee Elementary
School in Los Alamitos. But Burnett's class used a very different strategy
from the one that worked so well for Nieland's class.
The fifth-graders bought shares of eight companies. They bought recognizable
stocks such as 7-Eleven and Hasbro, and they bought in a variety of industries
ranging from health care to computers to automotive. The idea was to spread
the risk.
``Hasbro might go down, then Coopers Tire and Rubber might go up,'' Macy
Stout, one of Burnett's students, said. ``Not all of our stocks would go
down.''
This diversification strategy took a small toll in terms of enjoyment, Stout
said. Compared with the other stocks, Callon Petroleum shares were rather
dull.
``That's not exactly the funnest (stock). But because the oil prices were
going up, we chose that one to see if it was going to do well,'' he said.
Devyn Miller, another of Burnett's students, said at least some of the victory
was because of calculations and preparation.
``A couple weeks before (the buy date) we looked at some of the lower-priced
stocks,'' Miller said. ``Then we started to take little notes on them, (to
measure) how they were doing. That's how we picked some of them out.''
The class finished with $1,350.73 more than its hypothetical investment.
Second place went to Carolyn Taylor's fourthgrade class at Magee Elementary
in Pico Rivera. Third went to Angela Roddy-Brown's thirdgraders at Pat Nixon
Elementary in Cerritos.
Burnett, the teacher at Lee, said the class hasn't yet decided how to spend
the prize money. He said they've talked about buying tickets to a movie,
donating it to the school or throwing a party just for them.
In the end, Burnett said, the class saw that there may be benefits to studying
math and business after all.
``They learned lots of stuff and had a good time,'' Burnett said.
==============================================
06-10-02
The Oregonian
Reinventing the classroom
CLIFTON R. CHESTNUT
Dave Masunaga went to George Middle School as the principal in 1997 on a
mission to raise the academic profile of the North Portland school.
Masunaga, a Portland educator for 32 years, was disturbed that so many George
students were reading and doing math below grade level. Of eighth-graders
taking state tests during the 1997-98 school year, 28 percent met reading
benchmarks, and 24 percent met math standards.
To turn achievement around, Masunaga and his staff of 50 teachers and support
staff have built a program like no other middle school in the city. Each
student at George spends middle school with the same teacher for three years.
Sixth-, seventh- and eighth-grade students share reading, language arts
and social studies lessons.
The multi-age arrangement has allowed teachers to forge closer relationships
with students and their families. And teachers say they are able to hold
students more accountable, instead of having them for just a year.
The system has paid off. By 2001, 47 percent of eighth-graders met or exceeded
reading standards, and 46 percent met math benchmarks.
During a ceremony this week, George will become the first Portland middle
school to receive a Trail Blazer Award from the Portland Schools Foundation.
For the sixth year, the nonprofit foundation honors schools that have made
significant gains and recognizes educators who have had an extraordinary
effect on their students.
At George, in the St. Johns neighborhood, one in five of the 558 students
speaks limited English. Nearly 74 percent of students are from low-income
families and qualify for free or reduced-price meals.
Teachers have brought in students from nearby Roosevelt High School to mentor
native Spanish speakers and set up after-school help for limited-English
students.
Latino students at George outperform their counterparts around the city.
Of the Latino students who started at George in 1998 and left the eighth
grade in 2001, 73 percent met or exceeded reading benchmarks. Across the
district, 48 percent of Latino eighth-graders met those standards, compared
with 76 percent of white students.
Teacher Kathy Williams has 32 students in a class where Spanish and English
are spoken. She prepares lessons three years in advance to teach in the
multi-age program.
Masunaga knows it's a lot of work.
"I don't want teachers to get discouraged when we don't get students
meeting benchmarks," Masunaga says. "I want them to look at the
data."
Three other schools will receive Trail Blazer Awards this week:
Boise-Eliot Elementary, in North Portland, for a schoolwide redesign that
has boosted reading and math scores.
Marysville Elementary, in Southeast Portland, a 2001 award recipient that
has significantly increased family and community involvement.
Vestal Elementary, in Northeast Portland, a 2001 award winner, for using
research-based math and literacy methods to raise test scores.
Each school will receive $2,000 for instructional materials.
The foundation also is honoring 16 educators. This group has a total of
more than 290 years of experience in Portland Public Schools. Their schools
will receive $1,000 each for books or materials.
The winners include:
John Brunecz, math teacher at Roosevelt High; Winnie Charley, seventh-grade
teacher at Jackson Middle; Richard Cheek, teacher at Fernwood Middle; Pepye
Ladd, librarian at Maplewood Elementary; Marianne McClenagh, second-grade
teacher at Maplewood Elementary; Michael Scott, fourth-grade teacher at
Buckman Elementary; Mike Sweeney, teacher at Lincoln High; and, Suzanne
Thiel, teen parent program director and teacher at Roosevelt High.
A group of six winners from Woodmere Elementary includes lead teachers,
a Title I coordinator, a literacy coordinator and a parent liaison. They
are Penny Clouser, Jodi Lepley, Saundra Liberator, Becky Martin, Kathy McGowan
and Martha Vail.
The two principals receiving awards are Willie Poinsette of Robert Gray
Middle and Pam Shelly at Metropolitan Learning Center.
==============================================
HARTFORD COURANT
06/10/02
Program Combats Bullying In School
By LORETTA WALDMAN, Courant Staff Writer
PLAINVILLE -- Ann Bucchi doesn't think of the kids she works with as bullies.
Sure, some end up in her tiny office at Louis Toffolon Elementary School
after kicking or pushing a classmate, but they are not bullies: not yet
anyway.
Bucchi's mission is to keep it that way. Working with Toffolon principal
Lynn Lagoyke and school psychologist Jeri Turkowitz, she patrols the halls
and playground like a neighborhood beat cop, smoothing conflict before it
turns into a pattern of brutality or worse.
Equal parts mother and pal, the affable aide operates out of the TLC room,
a sort of anti-bullying command center carved out of a storage room she
shares with shelves of textbooks. Students, referred by teachers or visiting
voluntarily, spill their concerns to Bucchi there and map out strategies
to address them.
A construction paper traffic signal on the wall reminds them to stop, calm
down and think. A box of Kleenex sits nearby in case of tears.
The anti-bullying program, introduced at Toffolon about two years ago, is
the kind state education officials would like to duplicate in other school
districts. With the help of a $50,000 state Department of Education grant,
Plainville is looking at ways to do that as it develops the first model
anti-bullying project in the state.
"We distributed 26 other competitive grants of smaller amounts, but
we really felt we wanted to work with one district to develop a more comprehensive
approach to the issue, " said Nancy Pugliese, a consultant to the department's
Safe and Drug Free Schools program.
Jolted by school shootings in Colorado and elsewhere, a handful of states,
including Connecticut, have introduced programs to defuse schoolyard aggression
before it turns violent. Unlike many of those states, Connecticut has never
had a shooting, but experts know other long-term effects of bullying like
depression, poor attendance and grades, and even suicide can be as devastating
and sometimes precede outbursts of retaliatory rage.
Jeffrey Bongard, Plainville's director of pupil services, says that along
with school programs, parents and the community play an important role in
combating the problem. Shortly after receiving the grant in April, Bongard
met with representatives of agencies ranging from the police department
to the YMCA, most of whom served on a Community Coalition for Youth Development
he hopes to resurrect as the framework for a local prevention network.
Outwardly their activities appear to have little to do with bullying, but
everyone knows the issues they address are what lie beneath the problem.
Midway into their first brainstorming session, the collaboration had already
begun bearing fruit. To spare children the embarrassment and taunting that
goes along with returning to school in hand-me-downs and castoffs, Susie
Woerz, director of the local food pantry suggested weaving a back-to-school
clothing and bookbag drive into the effort. Plainville police Sgt. Charles
Smedick thought officers could ask a few more questions of truant students
to get at the real reason they're avoiding school.
"Plainville must literally become a neighborhood in its approach,"
Bongard told the group. "Every individual, agency, organization and
business in Plainville has a stake in this."
A major component of the project, Bongard says, will be to sensitize teachers,
parents and others in the community to the problem of bullying. A report
released last year by a bullying task force of the Governor's Prevention
Partnership indicates it is far more pervasive at the elementary school
level than people may realize.
Bullying and aggression occur at nearly nine out of 10 elementary schools
in the state, researchers found. Name-calling, teasing, hitting and socially
isolating behavior increases from grades one through five and 60 percent
of teachers devote fewer than 10 classroom periods per year to violence
prevention.
The consequences of ignoring the issue are sobering.
By age 24, people who are identified as bullies after the age of 7 are six
times more likely than non-bullies to be convicted of a crime, the report
says. By age 30, they are four times more likely to have three criminal
convictions.
Aggressors are not the only concern. The students they target are far more
likely to bring a weapon to school than children who are not targeted, according
to the report. Being teased, in fact, was one of the characteristics shared
by school shooters at Columbine High School in Colorado, where two teenage
gunmen killed 13 people before committing suicide in 1999.
"Schools have traditionally ignored the warning signs and are not helping
these kids and supporting them," said Jo Ann Freiberg, executive director
of Operation Respect CT, a non-profit organization dedicated to creating
a climate of respect in schools and the community. "The solution rests
with empowering the bystander to have a zero tolerance attitude toward these
behaviors," she said.
Plainville is not the only community taking a stand on what has become a
national concern. Freiberg, who conducts workshops on the issue, said she
has dealt with 575 organizations and public and private schools in and beyond
Connecticut since incorporating two years ago.
At Toffolon, the emphasis has been on empowering children to diffuse aggression
on their own, be they perpetrator or victim. When Bucchi saw a first-grader
take a swing at another student flicking a finger at him, "we talked
about him using his words," she said. "Kids learn not to be physically
aggressive."
Kristen Carroccia and Abby Chapman, two fifth-graders, turned to Bucchi
when they noticed the more athletic kids dominating others when the class
played kickball. Every day, the girls watched the game crumble in chaos
as everybody argued about the rules.
"Three people got a turn to go up because we were fighting so much,"
said Chapman, 10. "It took up half our recess."
With Bucchi's help, and the approval of classmates, the pair drafted a set
of rules that restored order.
"Years ago, a fight would have happened," Lagoyke said. "Now
we hopefully do it in the opposite direction; create the rules to avoid
a fight. I just think kids come away from this with much better skills for
solving problems, which is something that they will use for the rest of
their life."
==============================================
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