nothin City Sets Sights On Achievement Gap | New Haven Independent

City Sets Sights On Achievement Gap

Melissa Bailey Photo

Using the test scores that came out Thursday, Superintendent Reggie Mayo drew a starting line for an ambitious race — for city students to catch up with their statewide counterparts in five years.

Mayo made his announcement Thursday afternoon, a few hours after the state released results of the Connecticut Mastery Tests (CMTs) for the 2009-10 school year. CMTs are required for all public school students in grades 3 to 8.

Mayo said the new data marks Year Zero” for school reform — the benchmark by which the city’s progress will be measured, as part of a nationally watched school change campaign.

Mayo and Mayor John DeStefano have pledged to close the city’s achievement gap by 2015. That means over the next five years, New Haven Public School students will reach the state average of students performing at goal” on Connecticut Mastery Tests.

The results are encouraging, but we still have a long way to go,” Mayo said.

For full test results from all the city’s schools, check the state’s website. (Click here to read about last year’s performance.)

New Haven now lags between 25 and 35 points behind the state average on the CMTs, depending on the grade level and subject.

For example: 24.9 percent of third-graders in New Haven read at goal,” a benchmark that means at grade level.” That puts them 32.2 points behind the statewide average, which is 57.1 percent.

Click here for a break-down of how big the gap is, for each grade and subject.

The city inched toward closing the achievement gap this year: Overall, the district improved by 2.4 percentage points across the four subject areas, doubling the state’s progress, which was 1.2 points.

DeStefano called that progress incremental.” In order to really close the gap, students will need exponential” growth, with test scores improving by double-digits, he said.

Alex Johnston, a New Haven school board member and head of ConnCAN, agreed. He called New Haven’s scores a good starting point” for the reform goals — but we’re going to need even greater gains in the years to come to achieve that goal.”

Closing New Haven’s gap in five years would be a phenomenal” feat, he said. It’s the kind of bold goal that you need … to keep focused on the very hard work to come.”

New Haven out-paced other major Connecticut cities in performance gains, according to an analysis by the education watchdog group ConnCAN. Click here to read that analysis.

Principals were waiting on pins and needles” this week to hear how their kids did, school officials said. That’s because these CMT scores will determine how the schools get graded. The district graded an initial batch of schools and placed them into three tiers. Three low-performers are being reconstituted; one is being taken over by a charter school. The rest of the schools will get graded in November. Further down the line, the test scores will also help determine whether teachers and principals keep or lose their jobs.

Students in grades 3 to 8 all take tests in math, reading and writing. Fifth- and eighth-graders also take science tests. Overall, the number of New Haven students scoring at goal” went up in 13 of the 20 tested areas. The biggest gain was in sixth-grade reading, where students improved from 39.2 to 55.9 points. Student scores fell 4.1 percent in third-grade writing and 7.5 percent in seventh-grade reading.

Those scores compare this year’s third-graders and seventh-graders to last year’s. More gains appear when you follow the same group of kids from year to year. Students who went from fifth grade in 2009 to sixth grade in 2010 showed impressive” gains in the at goal” scores, the district reported: They rose 17.1 percent in reading, and 6.5 percent in math.

Gaps between the state average will need to be closed on a school-by-school basis, said the mayor.

A half-dozen high-performing principals stood by Mayo’s side Thursday to share some highlights.

John Daniels School Principal Gina Wells (at left in photo above) said her English-Language learners improved remarkably. Those students don’t get instructed in English until second grade — then get tested in English in the third grade.

Students from Worthington Hooker and the Engineering, Science and University Magnet topped the district. Students across all grades in those two schools scored at least 80 percent at goal” on reading and math.

Mayo identified three schools as being of great concern”: Wexler-Grant, Microsociety Interdistrict Magnet School and Clemente Leadership Academy.

For example, only 5.6 percent of fifth-graders at Clemente scored at goal” in reading. The school serves 400 students in grades K to 8. School officials called Clemente’s scores unacceptable.” And while the whole state and city improved in all subjects in the sixth grade, Wexler Grant and Microsociety showed double-digit drops in sixth-grade reading and math, school officials reported.

High School

The state released scores from the Connecticut Academic Performance Test (CAPT), which is for 10th graders, at 11 a.m. Friday.

Click here to see the scores.

The city gave a sneak-peek at its results Thursday: The district had incremental” gains, an average of 3 percent, in math, reading and writing. Sophomores showed greater gains, of 10 percent, in science. The city’s two biggest high schools, Hillhouse and Cross, showed improvement across the board. New Haven Academy led the district in gains, according to school officials. The full test results weren’t available Thursday.

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