How 3 Schools Raised Test Scores Sharply

A Buena Park school left its mediocre test scores behind, recording dramatic increases this year.

A school in South Los Angeles is suddenly approaching the national average on standardized tests after counting itself among the city’s lowest achievers.

A third campus, in Silver Lake, has surpassed its own expectations by leaping 12 percentile points to the head of the academic pack.

These three schools, all of which have shown remarkable gains on this year’s Stanford 9 exam, offer a picture of the creative measures that campuses across California are taking to enhance achievement and improve test scores.

They also have provided models for others to follow: The superintendent in Buena Park says she will encourage other schools in the district to adopt the winning strategies of Charles G. Emery Elementary School. And the two in Los Angeles have been singled out for study by the Los Angeles Unified School District, which hopes their success can be duplicated elsewhere.

“We’re definitely going to look at those schools and others that have made significant gains,” said Supt. Ruben Zacarias. “These practices need to be shared with all teachers.”

At Emery, Bright and Ivanhoe elementary schools:

* Teachers talk to one another about their work. They huddle regularly to analyze successes and failures, to share materials and to refine their instruction.

* Principals encourage practical reforms, facilitate an open exchange of ideas and create an atmosphere in which teachers feel free to be creative.

* Administrators and teachers routinely assess student progress to target deficiencies and buttress strengths.

* Students gear up for the state standardized exam, the Stanford 9, by taking practice tests and reviewing the format.

* And each school is learning to contend with its own world of problems.

At Bright Elementary in South Los Angeles, every one of the 846 students qualifies for subsidized lunches. Although poverty is often a predictor of low achievement, the school’s composite test score jumped from the 30th percentile to the 42nd this year, approaching the national average.

Ivanhoe Elementary, which serves a mostly middle-class student body in Silver Lake, must work with inadequate facilities and a nagging annual deficit. But it has watched scores rise from the 57th percentile to the 69th after teachers reorganized themselves into teams to pool their strengths and design new approaches to instruction.

Emery Elementary

When Emery Elementary first gave the Stanford 9 test in 1998, average scores were almost uniformly below the national median.

Most schools look to test scores as a way for teachers to evaluate their success with the previous year’s classes.

But at Emery, teachers also took a particularly close look at the strengths and weaknesses of the children who would be coming to them from lower grades, setting priorities based on their new students’ needs rather than their former students’ past performance.

Before last school year, each teacher analyzed the 1998 scores of the class’ incoming students. The teachers looked at which kinds of math problems their new students struggled with on the last test, and what aspects of their language skills needed improvement. Then they set their teaching priorities accordingly.

The result was scores that jumped by as much as 20 points or more. “They looked at the kids they taught last year, but they also looked at kids that were coming to them . . . what [they] would be coming to them with and what they were lacking,” says Buena Park School District Supt. Carol Holmes Riley. “They asked themselves, ‘What are we spending our time on?’ I think that was key, and I’m going to encourage that next year at other schools.”

After poring over the 1998 data, fifth- and sixth-grade teachers concluded that their incoming students needed to focus on grammar, language and math, according to teacher Christine Njust.

They spent extra time on these subjects, devoting a few additional minutes each day to something they wanted their students to improve.

Their vigilance paid off.

Fifth-grade spelling scores jumped more than 20 percentile points, from the 43rd percentile in 1998 to the 65th this year. Math results improved nearly as much, with fifth graders jumping from the 48th to the 66th percentile, and sixth graders going from 59th to the 75th percentile.

Scores at Emery rose significantly schoolwide, with strong improvement at every level except for the fourth grade. And while second grade percentile scores still hovered in the 40s--those students hadn’t taken the Stanford 9 test in 1998--most other grades scored at or above the national average in every subject.

Average percentile scores from the previous year had frequently been in the 30s. This year the school’s lowest score was in the 42nd percentile, in third grade reading.

Teacher Njust, a nine-year veteran of Emery, says that in addition to the teachers’ determination to raise scores, the children took the tests seriously as well.

While 1998 was the first year that students were given the exams, Njust says that this second time around they showed heightened confidence. “The children were really excited about it” she said. “They had the mentality that they wanted to do well.”

Njust says she and her fellow teachers at Emery are delighted by the gains, but admits that placing test scores at the forefront of their agenda also created a certain amount of pressure, especially at the beginning of the school year.

The Stanford 9 test “is definitely a focus in education now,” she says. “There has to be a standard to measure your success by, but it shouldn’t dominate the way you teach.”

Bright Elementary

Bright has been the target of intensive reforms for more than a decade, receiving millions of extra dollars in services through an initiative aimed at mostly black and Latino elementary schools.

As part of the Ten Schools program, the campus has received extra counselors and aides, plus smaller classes and additional staff development days, among other benefits.

The program has sought to raise test scores to the national median--the 50th percentile. Although other schools in the program have seen mixed results, Bright appears to be nearing that goal.

Its composite score in reading, math and language arts rose from the 30th percentile to the 42nd percentile. Virtually every grade that was tested surpassed the average for L.A. Unified elementary schools in the three subjects.

“Bright will never lower its expectations--realistic or not,” said Principal Marguerette Smith. “Not while I’m here.”

As at Emery, Bright’s teachers attribute their academic strides to a renewed focus on the basics.

The school supplements reading instruction with Open Court, a structured reading program that combines the word skills of phonics with rich literature. Teachers also require students to write and edit something every day--whether book reports, essays or letters--and they assign 600 minutes of extra recreational reading during the semester.

Another key lies in teacher communication. Teachers huddle weekly in the faculty lounge and in classrooms, poring over test results and other data from each grade to target weaknesses and craft strategies.

“At this school, showing a weakness does not necessarily mean a student has a problem,” Smith said. “It may mean we need to teach a skill or subject in a different way.”

For example, consider how Bright addressed problems with second-graders who were having trouble listening to instructions. The plan of attack included daily readings of detailed stories with complex plots--and oral exams that forced students to rely on memory alone for the answers.

Bright’s second-grade reading scores rose 17 percentile points this year; fifth-grade reading scores increased 14 points.

“This is an enormous amount of hard work,” said Helene Solomon, a fourth-grade instructor and the teachers union representative at the school. She also credits the leadership of Smith, the principal.

“To our benefit, Marguerette is an incredibly strong leader--but not a tyrant,” Solomon said. “If we teach to the standards, maintain discipline and manage our classrooms, she gives us the freedom we need. If we don’t, she buddies us up with a proper mentor.”

Everything at Bright is a reflection of the order that Smith brings to the school.

The brass nameplate near the main entrance is polished daily. The playground is litter-free. The hallways are spotless, the students cheery and well behaved.

“I want every one of my kids to feel good and do well here,” Smith said. “The real credit goes to my teachers. I’m just a facilitator.”

The jump in Ivanhoe’s composite score for reading, math and language arts from the 57th to the 69th percentile far exceeded the results of many schools in the county.

The composition of the student body played a role. The vast majority already speak English fluently, and many do not have to overcome the problems of poverty.

Ivanhoe serves children from mostly middle-class homes in the winding hills of Silver Lake. Just 17% of the school’s 350 students speak limited English, so few that their scores were not even reported separately for the Stanford 9.

But there’s more to it. Parents play an active role in running the school, and Ivanhoe has radically altered how it organizes instruction.

With the arrival of Principal Kevin Baker three years ago came new ideas that initially met resistance but have firmly taken hold.

The school divides teachers into grade-level teams--kindergarten-first, second-third, fourth-fifth. The teams meet twice a week, allowing teachers to design 10-week units of study that reflect state standards.

The teams draw on the strengths of their members, who take the lead in subjects that reflect their expertise. Teachers who specialize in math or reading, for example, meet regularly with their counterparts from other grades to ensure that the curriculum is suited to the abilities of students.

Teachers say the new organization has opened lines of communication throughout the school. “There are no grand egos,” Karen Park, a kindergarten teacher, said of the teams. “Nobody stands up and says, ‘I’ve got the right to do this or that.’ ”

Baker introduced another change that has gained popularity. Instead of traditional parent-teacher conferences, students lead their own assessments after every 10-week grading period--to engage them in their education and involve parents.

The children walk their parents through their schoolwork, explaining what they learned and what they need to improve. They also set down their goals on paper. Parents respond in writing, a process that some label “psychobabble,” but others find valuable.

Bela Messex, 9, said the conferences help. “I told my mom and dad that I was really good at social studies but that I needed to work on math--times tables and stuff like that,” the fifth-grader said.

Bela’s mother said the conferences offer an important link to her son. At a recent one, Bela wrote how he wanted help with math through drilling and memorizing formulas.

“Once I knew what he wanted, I was able to help him,” said Kim Jones-Messex. “I understood what I needed to work on at home.”