Our View: It’s clear success can be achieved; now it’s a matter
of dedication
Hopeful signs exist in the battle to raise math scores in the Gilroy Unified School District.
The first is that third-grade GUSD students exceed state averages on the California Standards Math test. Clearly, GUSD students aren’t incapable of understanding math. But those scores drop sharply in fourth grade, falling below the state average, where they remain through the seventh grade. (After grade seven, assessments are based on math class enrollment, not grade, meaning a grade-by-grade comparison is not meaningful.)
The second is that the district, recognizing the abysmal state of math scores, recently held a conference to study the issue. The subject of the block schedule at Gilroy High School was addressed at that summit. The block schedule means that GHS students attend math classes every other day, not good for a subject that is best learned by daily instruction and practice.
Another is the wonderful work being done by the third-grade team teachers at Glen View Elementary School. Despite having a high percentage – 77 percent – of poor students, and a high percentage – 47 percent – of English-language learners, the school’s third-graders are posting ever-improving math scores.
That progress is due to a team-teaching approach that allows teachers to swap students and work with them on areas that they’re finding difficult to master. In addition, students know where they stand and are motivated to master the material to move into a different group.
It sounds like common sense when GUSD Superintendent Edwin Diaz distills the prescription for improving academic performance to setting high expectations, collaborating, monitoring goals and maintaining a relentless focus on improvement. And it is common sense – and dedication.
We need to make sure our students understand what we expect from them academically, frequently measure where they stand in relation to those goals, re-teach concepts until they’re mastered before introducing new concepts, and work together to make certain all that happens. When teachers hit upon a formula that works, as the third-grade teachers at Glen View clearly have done, we need to replicate that success.
The prescription for academic excellence requires teacher mentoring, student pullouts, team teaching, revising the high school’s block schedule, posting student progress, posting test results by teacher and firing teachers who don’t perform.
Too often institutional barriers – bureaucracy and/or teachers’ union entrenchment – stand in the way of teaching our kids.
The prescription for academic excellence addresses issues that are under the district’s control. It does not rely on factors that the district cannot influence, things like parental involvement, having middle class students or having students who are fluent in English to make a real difference. Glen View’s third-grade experience demonstrates that.
GUSD exists to educate Gilroy’s students. We must do whatever it takes to accomplish that goal.
