The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
New programs in place
In its first year getting used to a new system of reporting student performance, the Gunnison Watershed School District is taking a few knocks for its standardized test scores in math and reading as well as a hit for a couple of teachers who aren’t considered by the state to be “Highly Qualified.”
The teacher qualification issue might be blamed on the size of the district. Superintendent Jon Nelson says a teacher is considered to be highly qualified if they’re licensed in every area that they teach, and in a small district that isn’t always possible.
“It will always be a problem for small districts,” he says. “At times you will see ads for small districts asking for a teacher who can teach band, math, [physical education] and coach.” But there are alternative licensure programs that the district has been taking advantage of and Nelson hopes to get 100 percent of the district’s teachers “highly qualified” status soon.
The shortcomings in reading and math the district reported stem from Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) test scores that showed part of the fifth grade falling below the state average of 66 percent proficiency in math. In 2009, 63 percent of the district’s fifth graders tested as proficient in math and in 2010, the percentage of fifth graders testing as proficient dropped to 59 percent.
“Gunnison Elementary School [GES] did not meet [Average Yearly Progress] and because the student numbers at GES represent a large portion of the overall district numbers, their scores can have a large affect on the district score,” he said.
The “root cause” of the problems in math are “inconsistent programming, a lack of professional development in the math department and a lack of “fidelity in within the curriculum,” meaning there are inconsistencies in the way different sections are taught in the same subject, according to the plan.
The district implemented a new math curriculum this year that Nelson hopes to show its effectiveness in the next five years. That’s how long he has given the district’s reading program to show gains.
Nelson said, “We know the reading program will take about 3 to 5 years to see results. So if in five years we’re not seeing the results we expected, then we need to readjust something in the program.”
Another reason CSAP reading scores have fallen is the non-English-speaking students that have entered the district in recent years and effect the overall district performance.
The district has 160 English language learners. And there’s a plan in place to bring those students out of the classrooms for individual instruction that will, hopefully, bring them up to speed.
“We are implementing the new math curriculum this year, we are utilizing an aligned standards based curriculum in reading that is being taught with fidelity to close our gaps and we are implementing a new file and application review process that CDE outlined for us to help ensure HQ status for all teachers,” Nelson said of the steps the district has taken to improve its standing.
The district closed 2010 and opened 2011 with a committee effort to develop a Unified Improvement Plan to show the state and federal education overseers that they were on top of the few problems they have.
The Improvement Plan, which has to be submitted to the state by January 17, replaces the school improvement plan and accreditation plan that were two separate documents completed by the district annually prior to this year. Gunnison Valley School also needs to submit an Improvement plan to the state.
The other schools in the district are on a “Performance Planning Schedule” and will submit their own plan to the district in March for a final look by the district’s review committee before the entire lot is sent to the Colorado Department of Education by April 15.
Even though the new reporting was slow to get off the ground. “It’s going to be easier,” Nelson said of the new Unified Improvement Plan, because it puts all of the relevant information that can be drawn from the standardized tests in front of the district’s administrators when they’re making decisions about which programs work and which don’t.
