After a year of focus group meetings, conducting and analyzing surveys and questionnaires, performing research, and interviewing students, parents, teachers, and administrators, the school district’s internal team charged with reviewing the district’s math program will be presenting its report to the WW-P school board at its meeting on Tuesday, August 26.##M:[more]##
The math program review began in August, 2006, when a committee was formed to evaluate and improve the math curriculum. The committee is chaired by High School South Principal Charles Rudnick and includes the district’s three math supervisors: Chris Herte, the district’s high school-level mathematics supervisor, along with middle school supervisor Barbara Braverman, and elementary school supervisor David Argese. Teachers on the committee include Ardi Allen, Vanessa Clax, Janet Jackson, Robert Krech, Jill Marsch, Rochelle Newman, and Lee Werner. Richard Kaye is the school board member.
To help with the math review process, the district hired consulting firm Math Foundations LLC for $26,”180.
According to Steve Mayer, assistant superintendent for curriculum and enrollment, the biggest recommendation in the report is the suggestion that algebra be offered to all eighth graders.
“We have a very, very strong math program in the district,” Mayer says. “The report and findings were very complimentary as to what we’re doing,” including the various types of calculus offered at the high school level. A small number of students who have achieved beyond the highest course also have the option of taking math courses at Princeton University.
Currently, at the eighth grade level, about 50 percent of the students complete an algebra course before leaving middle school and moving on to high school, Mayer explains. But rearranging the curriculum to ensure all students complete one algebra course before moving on to high school will open the possibility that more students will reach higher level courses in high school, he says.
However, this will require some re-structuring, Mayer says. “To add more to an eighth grade year that’s already filled, you have to take away something else,” he explains. “When you take away something else, you have to put it somewhere else.”
So, in effect, courses might have to then be moved down to a seventh grade level, and so on and so forth. “It will likely be a couple of years before we’re able to transition pushing kids into algebra,” he said.
Mayer says the goal is to align the district with national standards, and continue to honor the requirements set forth in high-stakes testing.
Still, the way the program review is structured, the board will have to accept the report that comes from the program review. “At that point, the internal team will go back and work with me and draft an action plan,” Mayer said. “You can’t act on all the recommendations at once.” Instead, the team will come up with a time line, a critical path document, and present this to the board, which will highlight its plans for implementing these recommendations.
Other recommendations in the report to come before the board at the August 26 meeting include increasing the time for mathematical instruction at the K-5 level. Currently, these students receive 40 minutes of math instruction every day, and the math program review report calls for that to be increased to an hour. The report also recommends professional development to ensure teachers are able to transition effectively.
