Schools

5 Of 6 Johnston Schools Meet State Goals

Johnston High School missed one of 13 standards set by the Rhode Island Department of Education.

A few percentage points in 's graduation rate were the only shortfall in an otherwise positive report on local schools by the Rhode Island Department of Education.

Each year, RIDE releases its "Report Card" on all of the schools in the 36 districts in Rhode Island; the 2011 results — reflecting data collected during the 2010 school year — were released on May 5.

According to the RIDE data, all four of Johnston's elementary schools and met the standard known as Adequate Yearly Progress, or AYP.

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"We're very proud of that result," Supt Dr. Bernard DiLullo said during an interview on May 6. "That bar keeps getting raised by the state, so it shows that the elementary and middle schools have done very well."

The one exception to the good news was the high school's graduation rate; according to the state data, 71.34 percent of eligible students graduated last year. The state target was 76.7 percent, and it was that difference that put the high school on RIDE's "Insufficient Progress" list.

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DiLullo explained how that number was determined, and how the district is working to address the issue so the graduation rate increases.

After years of tracking students from their ninth grade entry into high school until they earned a diploma or GED — no matter how long it took — the state changed its reporting requirement.

Now, school districts check the students who enter school in ninth grade against only four- and five-year graduation lists to produce a "hybrid number," DiLullo explained.

In the case of the 2011 Report Card, 67 percent of the students eligible to graduate in 2010 — that is, those who started in 2006 — earned diplomas. The additional 4 percent represents five-year graduates.

District Work To Improve

DiLullo said the district is working on several fronts to improve chances for students to graduate on time, beginning with core subject programs.

"We want to give attention to ELA (English Language Arts) and math skills," he explained. "We have a number of students who are enrolled in double math programs to help build those skills."

Another intiative is what DiLullo calls "vertical articulation," which means getting teachers together to coordinate instruction across grade levels — from middle school to high school, for example.

"We're starting to work on aligning our curricula to better prepare students for their graduation requirements," DiLullo said. "We're getting the middle school and high school (teachers) talking to each other, and also setting up that communication between the middle school and elementary schools so you have that continuum of learning."

Another key strategy is keeping at-risk and special education students in school, and here, the district's high school annex at Calef School is a major component of that effort, DiLullo said.

"We want to keep a special watch on our at-risk students," he explained. "We're continually working on personalization of instruction and getting to know our students well (so that) we're helping our students meet their high school goals."

Having an in-district placement for at-risk students allows for quicker referrals, which means a better chance at keeping them in school until they graduate.

"That program has helped a lot in terms of helping our high-risk students," DiLullo said. "The real key, though, is you're looking for motivation from the students themselves, so they can help themselves by putting in the effort on their own."

DiLullo said there are many individual situations behind the number of students who drop out of school, but generally, they have one central cause.

"From what I see, the students who truly drop out become discouraged, they feel like the work gets increasingly challenging and they're not able to keep up," DiLullo explained. "They give up relatively early and they wind up betting buried because of a few bad grades — when you score a 30 or 40 on an exam, that makes it pretty difficult to recover."

One short-term move that the district has already taken is proposing the addition of new programs at the high school. As part of the school district's proposed fiscal 2012 budget, the school committee included Computer Aided Design (CAD) and robotics vocational classes and four Advance Placement courses that DiLullo said are aimed at "expanding the whole range of experience for our high school students, from the lower-achieving to the higher-achieving."

In an e-mail message received later on May 6, DiLullo stated that he expects the new initiatives to increase the graduation rate in the near term.

"My hope is that we will improve this year, and with our proposed changes at the high school, we should start to see results within two years," DiLullo wrote.

The school spending plan, approved by the school board in March, is currently under review by Mayor Joseph M. Polisena, who is expected to propose a town budget to the town council within the next few weeks.

 

Update: Dr. DiLullo's e-mail message was added after the original article was published.


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