Lafayette studens may attend another school
Parents of children who attend Lafayette School in the Uniontown Area School District now have the option of sending their children to another school after recent Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) test scores came back low for the second consecutive year. Recently released results for the PSSA test administered in the 2005-06 school year revealed students in nearly every grade level missed proficiency targets in reading and math.
The following percentage of students at Lafayette School reached the advanced/proficient targets: grade 3, 42 percent in math, 26 percent in reading; grade 4, 35 percent in math, 20 percent in reading; grade 5, 47 percent in math, 10 percent in reading; grade 6, 42 percent in math, 21 percent in reading; grade 7, 22 percent in math, 36 percent in reading; grade 8, 21 percent in math, 43 percent in reading.
Results were provided by the state Department of Education. The goal is to have every student 100 percent proficient in each subject by 2014, according to the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. The test was administered to third through eighth grades.
As a result of the low scores, the state has placed Lafayette in the Phase I of School Improvement for not meeting Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) targets for two consecutive years.
The Pennsylvania Accountability System evaluates all Pennsylvania public schools and districts annually for AYP based on the results of the spring PSSA testing cycle and indicators of participation, attendance, and graduation, according to www.paayp.com. The AYP is a key measure of school performance established by the No Child Left Behind Act.
Required under Phase I of school improvement is the school district to offer parents a choice of where to send their children, with lower-performing students from low-income families having the first choice of transferring.
“Just because they made the request doesn’t mean it will be honored,” noted Uniontown Superintendent Dr. Charles Machesky.
Machesky said letters will be sent home with students on the first day of school indicating scores and what the district is going to do to improve the scores.
“We’re well into the school improvement process,” he added.
A list of schools to which parents may choose to transfer their children is not yet available.
Machesky said he is working to determine which schools can handle additional students without exceeding building capacity.
Through cooperation agreements with other neighboring school districts, parents also have the option to send their children to schools outside the Uniontown Area School District, if parents are willing to foot the cost of tuition.
Parents may contact the office of pupil personnel at school district administrative offices located in Central School by calling 724-438-4502, ext. 237. Carolyn Krepps is the supervisor of pupil personnel and the director of special education.
As a school improvement district, Uniontown Area must also submit a school improvement plan to the state Department of Education by Dec. 31 that details what the district is going to do to improve PSSA scores, said Machesky. A team of parents, administration and outside agencies such as universities must help develop the plan, he said.
Besides offering school choice, Machesky said the district has taken a number of steps that may work to improve scores in future years.
At a recent board meeting, Machesky introduced a new program called MP3. Uniontown Area was one of four school districts across the nation chosen for the program.
The MP3 program is the product of a partnership between the school district and the University of Pittsburgh. The program will be implemented into Lafayette elementary grade-level curriculum this upcoming school year.
The program will focus on reading with the goal to prevent reading failure before students fall too far behind, said Amanda Kloo, coordinator for projects at the university.
If all goes well, the model will be implemented at Menallen Elementary School in the 2007-08 school year, said Kloo, adding Ben Franklin School may also be introduced to the project in coming school years.
Some of the key elements in the program are teaching students to read aloud, to comprehend what they read and to understand vocabulary in the text.
The program is high-quality, research-based reading instruction being implemented in the Central Dauphin School District with the help of Lehigh University researchers and specialists.
“We will provide intervention and support for those who need it. Ultimately, we want to make sure all students are reading at their grade level so there’s less of a need for special education,” said Kloo.
Machesky described the program as an expansion of the school’s current reading curriculum that incorporates much greater levels of phonics and reading comprehension, two areas in which the curriculum was lacking.
“Those two areas and spelling are three components of an effective reading program that we feel we can enhance,” noted Machesky.
“We’ll implement the program, gather data and see what progress we will make,” he added.
The school district has made other changes this summer aimed to boost test scores at Lafayette, including reassigning six additional reading instructors to the school from various reading posts in the district, hiring a literacy coach and – a major change – having on board two principals, instead of one, to oversee the school. Joe Gailie will head sixth through eighth grades, while Paula Works will oversee first through fifth grades at Lafayette.
Thomas Colebank left his position as Lafayette principal to take a post as new principal of the high school after Peter Bozek retired earlier this year.
Despite the bleak news from Lafayette, Machesky noted third, fourth and fifth grades at Marclay School achieved 100 percent proficiency in math on the PSSA tests, and the same grades exceeded the advanced/proficiency targets in reading, with 91 percent of fourth grade students hitting the proficiency mark in reading.
Third-graders at Ben Franklin School also did well on the math portion of the test, with 97 percent of students performing at the advanced/proficient level.