School Supt. advises Board the district must eliminate huge Z gap

“This is an uncomfortable conversation,” School Supt. Michael Van Tassel told the Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education in the middle of a lengthy presentation on a severe district problem at a special meeting Aug.17.
He explained the “Z Score,” the large gap between the top 30% and bottom 30% of student scores at two schools – Tyler Elementary and McBride Middle School. That gap led to the state naming the two schools “Focus Schools” several years ago.
Three people in the audience listened to this presentation. Trustee Kevin English was absent from the board. The meeting was not recorded for cable TV.
Supt. Van Tassel said he was spending this time explaining to make sure the board understands that, “At the end of the day, if we don’t address the gap and the scores … we’re going to be in a great deal of hurt…
“We have a problem in the Van Buren Public Schools,” he went on. “We don’t want to dummy down the top. We’ve got to bring up the bottom.”
He said it is being done in other districts that have been “at it longer.” He referred to the “severity of where we are in two or three of the schools.”
“Saline doesn’t have the diverse population like we do,” said board vice president Martha Toth, obviously referring to a district that is doing it better.
Trustee Alison Bennett, a part-time English instructor at Schoolcraft College in Livonia, said two thirds of the students admitted to the college cannot read at a college level and some don’t make it through and come out owing a great deal of money with “nothing out of it.”
Trustee Kelly Owen asked when would the board know when the gap is decreasing and Van Tassel said when in measuring the gap the two scores become less. The data is over a three-year period.
“When we get our scores back … if we’re moving up and closing gaps faster than other districts … we could be a ‘Safe Harbor,” if you make one year growth in one year.”
If the gap doesn’t close, there are three options from the state: remove the staff, remove the principal, and takeover by the state. Later he said that includes removing the school board.
Van Tassel said for many years the district didn’t want to worry about the “Z Score” for the district. But, “for our district that gap is huge” and “our gap is wider than most.”
“We’re behind the game and we have to catch up,” he said.
“The bottom 30 are doing very, very poorly,” Van Tassel said.
He said the options are to lower the top scores (“But I couldn’t sleep at night.”), move the bottom up, or do nothing and be labeled a Priority School and, “The state takes you over.”
Van Tassel said they have to work as hard as they can, not lower the top students, and address the “Spotlight Children” in the middle and those at the bottom.
Curriculum Director Jeff Moore told of a third-grade assessment the district did where students were asked to multiply 10 x 10. The first class of 30 had 5% who could do it. The second class had 35% who could do it. The third class had 100% who could do it.
“What do we do with that information?” Moore asked, answering that they are analyzing what the data tells them and making a plan.
Van Tassel said when the fourth-grade teacher gets these kids, “What’s the principal going to do?”
“We’re talking about some serious issues,” said board president Brent Mikulski, encouraging the board members to contact Van Tassel if they want more information and can’t wait four weeks for another meeting.
“It’s up to us, every time we meet to discuss this,” Mikulski said.
Van Tassel said teachers are coming out of college less prepared for the classroom and students have an attitude, “Prove to me I should listen to you.”
He said they have to ensure to hire only the best and that they are committed to teaching here. He said if they don’t work out they need to terminate them before tenure and evaluate what good teachers look like.
Van Tassel said an administrator should be able to walk into a classroom and tell if good teaching is going on.
“We need to have really strong teachers and helping struggling teachers is the fastest way to improve,” he said.
The district has new teacher training and a new teacher academy throughout the year, he said. New to the district is classroom management training to support teachers having problems.
Van Tassel said he believes morale is driven from the building and building principal. They will do a Culture Climate Survey in the middle of October to “see if our perceptions are spot-on.” If not, they will look at ways to address it, he said.
More than two hours were spent with Van Tassel and Director of Curriculum Moore explaining what they were going to do to try to solve the Z problem.
In other business at the Aug. 17 meeting, board:
• Went into closed-door session at the beginning of the meeting “to consider material exempt from discussion or disclosure by state or federal statute”;
• Heard Mikulski say he looked at the bylaws to see what the board can’t and shouldn’t do and determined that the public is just allowed to make comments and there would be later follow-up by Van Tassel or board members to the speaker. He said they have to make sure they follow the bylaws;
• Approved the resignation of teacher Gunesha Fredericks of Edgemont after 15 years of service as of Feb. 15, 2016;
• Approved the hiring of two new teachers for McBride Middle School, Kelli Kubrak to teach English and Dawn McFarlin to teach Special Education, both as of Sept 1;
• Approved the resignations of non-instructional staff members Heather Wolf of Haggerty, after nine years of service, as of Aug. 12 to attend school; and Jennifer Youmans of transportation after one year as of Aug. 10;
• Approved the total cost of $271,540 out of sinking funds and awarded the construction contract to Best Asphalt in the amount of $208,000 as part of the overall Rawsonville Elementary Civil and Parking Lot Project. Davenport Brothers bid $223,000 and Pavex Co., $259,300. The project is to reconfigure the parking lot so there is expanded parking and more sidewalks to separate between pickup areas for parents and the buses. Eric Dumont of Plante Moran CRESA said they hopefully will be done before the “kids roll into school”; and
• Heard Van Tassel and Moore tell about the Administrative Retreat set for Aug. 19 and 20 to discuss hot-button issues, changes in the law, priorities, and things that aren’t going as well as possible. They went through big binders showing all the information that will be discussed with administrators including “non-negotiable” items.