On top of their education -- literally

Lauren Vane

Tents were set up and campers sat in a circle around a lantern,

animal crackers in hand. Oldies played on a radio and the sound of a

motorized mattress pump purred in the background.

It was a regular camp out Nov. 10, except that the campground was

the bumpy surface of the roof of the Marina High School

administration building.

Marina High School Principal Steve Roderick and fellow

administrators, Assistant Principal Kirk Kennedy, Vice Principal of

Supervision Jon Van Tassell, Vice Principal of Activities Jeanne

Ellis, and School Business Administrator, Rick Ebel, were camped out

on the roof to fulfill a promise they made to the students.

Kennedy said the administration told students last spring, that if

they improved state testing scores, the administration would sleep

overnight on the roof.

“We promised the students that if they actually got the highest

score in the district, we’d spend the night on the roof,” Kennedy

said.

The students increased the testing score by 30 points, and

although that was not the top score in the district, Kennedy said the

administration decided to reward the students anyway. “It’s a lot for

the students and testing is no fun, so we’ve tried to reward them a

little bit,” said Kennedy.

According to Kennedy, each April, ninth-, 10th- and 11th-grade

students must participate in the State Standardized Testing and

Reporting program that tests how the students are progressing in

learning basic academic skills.

Kennedy said the school established ian incentive program, which

included the rooftop administrator camp out, to help students meet

and surpass the state goal. The state goal was for the school to

reach a score of 742. The school earned a score 30 points higher than

that.

“The state average increase was 10 points, and the local area

increase was 18 points,” Kennedy said. “We went up 30.”

Roderick was equally impressed.

“We thought we would improve, but we didn’t believe how much we

improved,” Roderick said.

The principal credits the increase to the students and the support

of their parents and teachers.

Roderick said students at school on Wednesday did not believe the

administration was going to make good on their promise.

“They thought it was pretty funny,” Kennedy said. “Some of the

[students] are mad that we have tents. They wanted us to sleep out in

sleeping bags.”

Now that the administration has delivered the students’ reward, it

is already beginning a new incentive program for this year’s testing

in April.

“We’re going to try and increase the incentive,” Kennedy said.

Kennedy said they will have a new target goal for this year’s

testing scores.

But the spring testing dates were far away on Wednesday night. For

now, the students were enjoying their reward.

Janee Ortiz, of Westminster, is a 17-year-old senior at Marina

High School who said she is on the yearbook staff. Ortiz said she

came to the school on Wednesday night to make sure the administrators

had followed through on their promise.

“We need evidence,” Janee said. “This is hilarious, they said it

last year, but we didn’t think they’d come around to it.”