School Board hears report on low scores on spring M-Step test

“Our students aren’t performing where they need to be in this metric,” said Van Buren Public Schools Curriculum Director Jeff Moore at Monday’s regular meeting of the school board.
He gave a detailed report of the results of the spring M-Step test for students in grades 3-8, grade 11, and PSAT and PSA scores for grades 9-11.
After suggesting several things to consider, Moore said, “At the end of the day, they’re still not where they’re supposed to be.”
“We’re starting to see some successes … in the cohort data we’re seeing some slight gains … if only 20% of third graders are proficient, it’s a problem … makes a tough life for several children [if they are not proficient in reading]… I’m happy with the improvements at the high school … We need to perform better at third grade in ELA and math…”
Moore said they have added interventions, but have to make sure they aren’t pulling the students out of the classroom at the wrong time, during their reading and math lessons.
He said they are focusing more on assessments every single day, rather than test results once a year.
Moore provided numbers that showed that Savage was the only elementary school testing over the state average and all those in middle school and high school tested below state average.
“We want to be better than state average … We can’t settle for average,” said board president Keith Johnston.
“Many times the state average is nothing to write home about,” agreed member Alison Bennett.
Moore said in comparison to the rest of the country Michigan isn’t doing a very good job.
Johnston said as a board they want to measure where the students are.
“We talk with our staff and they tie it potentially to their livelihood,” Moore said. “We want to emphasize it’s for the best for our kids, rather than say, ‘you suck.’”
He said they are following the Blueprint which is based on research and with it, “You can’t go wrong.” He said teachers are being given more power.
“It’s important they have a choice in the direction we will go…” Kudlak said of the teachers. “Developing our teachers is our biggest asset. It’s the best thing we can do.”
At the end of the agenda, former school board member Sherry Frazier had comments from the audience.
“I’ve heard the same thing, year after year,” Frazier said, noting the state average is so low it’s an embarrassment.
She said the state is putting more and more on the teachers and not giving them resources. Frazier said at a district she worked at the limit for students for first and second grade was 20-22. She said there is a class in Van Buren that has 32-35 in kindergarten.
“We’re hiring a teacher for that,” Kudlak said.
Frazier suggested the board needs to sit down and look at the budget because there is a need to try something different.
Kudlak said more kindergarteners registered for school than expected this year, which was a good thing and, “I think we’ll have enough students to meet our budget.”
He said it is frustrating to have to approve a budget in the spring before it is known how many students will be in the district in the fall.
“It’s not working,” Frazier said of the measures Moore talked about to raise student scores. She said Moore, and curriculum directors before him, talked about test scores going up one or two points as successes, but that’s not enough.
Frazier said Savage has the best scores and Kudlak said one-third of the students are in the gifted group at Savage.
“That didn’t seem to come into being with the big brouhaha [over Savage M-Step scores in the past]. I wonder if they cheated again at Savage,” she said, referring to the ongoing rift over Savage scores. Frazier was the only school board member not sued by Savage teachers because she rejected the cheating charge.
“If we want to be the best, we need to think outside the box,” Frazier said.
Frazier complimented Kudlak on his comment about the development of teachers as the district’s biggest asset. She said teachers are in the classroom every day with the students.
Reggie Mulligan, a retired teacher, said maybe they are looking at things from the wrong end. She said she wrote MEAP tests in the past and, “Now it’s so covert. You can’t look at the test before, during, and after the testing and if a student asks for help you only can say, read the question again.
“If I wrote a test and so few passed, I’d ask myself what I did wrong,” she said. “Who’s examining the test writers?”
Frazier said she would like to see a comparison of scores with Keystone Charter Academy, where many Van Buren students are attending. She said the Keystone students are “breathing the same air” as the present Van Buren students and she wonders if their scores could be better.
In other business at its Sept. 11 meeting, the board:
• Approved four board members as delegates for the Nov. 9 Michigan Association of School Boards Delegate Assembly in Lansing: Keith Johnston, Kelly Owen, Alison Bennett, and Darlene Gerick. Susan Featheringill and Simone Pinter are alternates. Kevin English said he could not attend;
• Approved terminations of teacher Kyle Gleason of BHS after two years of service as of Aug. 31, accepted other employment; Linda Maxwell of Owen retiring after 20 years of service on Sept. 1; and Caterina Delia of Haggerty GSRP after three years of service, terminated as of Aug. 16;
• Approved hiring teachers David Mahoney for BHS as of Aug. 30; Kelly Jesue for Savage as of Aug. 30; Joseph Marino for BHS/Owen as of Sept. 5; Heather Fischer for Owen, as of Sept. 5; Jeffrey Wiemer for McBride as of Sept. 6; and Sarah Hern for Haggerty as of Sept. 15;
• Accepted the resignation of non-instructional staff member Candice Testorelli of Owen after one year of service because she took another job;
• Approved the hiring of the following non-instructional employees: Gina Murphy as half-time secretary at Rawsonville, Amber Maples as lunch room supervisor at Tyler, Tilden Dickens as lunch room supervisor at Owen; also, the following paraprofessionals: Jennifer Drogowski at BHS, Vicki Ceckiewicz at Owen, Pamela Underdahl-Ackerman in the Adult Trans. Program at Haggerty, Chance Lowell at Edgemont, Lauren Vandierendonck at Owen, Ethel Frankling at Haggerty, and Krisandra McKay at Edgemont;
• Heard Kelly Owen report that the Van Buren Education Foundation’s Sunset fundraiser on Saturday was the biggest fund raiser they’ve had to date, with a lot of staff there to show what they did with their grants. School Supt. Kudlak said there were more than 200 people in attendance;
• Heard Supt. Kudlak say, “We’ve lost one of our own,” in reference to former teacher Ron Mays. He announced the memorial service will be at 11 a.m., Sept. 23, at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in New Boston;
• Heard Supt. Kudlak announce that the All Class Alumni Reunion on Saturday will feature Polish food this year; and
• Heard Human Resources Director Abdul Madyun report that a lot more staff than usual showed up for the free breakfast and that’s a good sign of increased morale. He said he has been sending out exit interviews to those leaving the district and, “I have to tweet to see if I can get more replies.”