Sixth grade moving schools

TeWinkle Middle School has made exceptional progress in its quest to be removed from a federal watch list of lagging schools, Newport-Mesa school district officials said today.

Nine district educators put in charge of reviewing TeWinkle after it was placed on the No Child Left Behind Act’s Program Improvement list gave high marks to the middle school’s progress and felt confident it would soon be removed from the watch list.

The committee’s evaluation didn’t advocate any drastic changes except ending TeWinkle’s sixth-grade instruction, a move that has been in the works for a long time. TeWinkle is the last middle school in Newport-Mesa to have a sixth grade. Sixth-grade education in the district will be exclusively handled by the elementary schools starting next year.

TeWinkle has been designated a Program Improvement school for the past four years because of poor performance on the California Standards Tests. The tests are designed to measure English-language and basic math skills.

A review board formed by the district revealed the results of a monthlong evaluation of TeWinkle on Friday. Many of the committee members who reviewed the school are critical of No Child Left Behind, but they were excited about the school’s prospects.

“This is a school that is virtually night-and-day different,” said Tom Antal, committee member and director of secondary education at the district. “There has been more change at this school than any I’ve ever seen in my career.”

No Child Left Behind relies on two basic indicators of success that are calculated from the same standardized test scores. One of the indicators measures year-to-year progress, and the other indicator measures a school’s achievement against a federal standard.

TeWinkle’s scores have improved rapidly the last few years, but they still haven’t reached the federal benchmark for achievement. Some committee members think that having a uniform nationwide standard for English and math proficiency is misguided.

“We’re all interested in how far we can bring a child in a single year,” Antal said. “When we have a child come from out of the country and we measure their progress by an arbitrary benchmark of fluency, it’s ridiculous.”

TeWinkle fell short of the federal standard last year because English-language learners and special-education students did not meet the requisite English proficiency standards.

As a result, the review board advised TeWinkle officials to replace staff, extend the school day and appoint an outside expert to monitor the school. This year, TeWinkle extended its school day by nearly an hour on average, and a new principal, Kirk Bauermeister, was hired.

Bauermeister is a strong proponent of No Child Left Behind and he’s confident that his students will do much better on this year’s round of standardized tests coming up in a few weeks.

“I think that No Child Left Behind is one of the best things to happen in education in the last century,” Bauermeister said. “The only bad part is the sanctions.”

TeWinkle has targeted a group of 46 English-language learners for a specialized two-week review session before the upcoming test. Bauermeister sees this cramming as a positive way of reinforcing the curriculum, and rejects the criticisms that No Child Left Behind forces teachers to “teach to the test.”

He has monitored the students’ progress all year and has the utmost confidence that this will be the year TeWinkle gets one leg out of Program Improvement, staving off additional sanctions. Some of the more extreme sanctions could include dismissal of educators and a federal takeover of the school.

“I don’t think that their test scores will improve, I know they will improve,” Bauermeister said.

“We, as a district, could not be more proud of TeWinkle,” said Chuck Hinman, assistant superintendent of K-12 education. “They’re just doing great work.”

ALAN BLANK may be reached at (714) 966-4623 or at alan.blank@latimes.com.