During its meeting on Tuesday, October 28, the Alameda Unified School District (AUSD) Board of Education focused on Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) results as the single general business item. The meeting was accompanied by an extensive study session with various district staff on ongoing literacy efforts in classrooms.
The SBAC is an annual assessment taken by students in third through eighth grade and in eleventh grade each spring. It measures progress in English Language Arts (ELA) and math. District staff typically outline student exam performance and trends as part of an annual presentation to the Board in the fall, but this year Superintendent Pasquale Scuderi and Lindsey Jenkins-Stark, Senior Manager of Data, Assessment, and Research, opted for a new workshop format to welcome active participation from board members and get insight from key AUSD staff who are actively leading strategic actions to improve student literacy.
Overall, AUSD students tend to perform consistently better than their peers in Alameda County and around California on the ELA SBAC. The percentage of students who meet or exceed ELA standards continues to rise toward pre-pandemic student achievement levels, and this trend is mirrored in results for many grade levels and student groups. However, as a result of persistent opportunity gaps between Black/African American and Hispanic students compared to other student groups, AUSD has made it a priority to explore strategies that help increase literacy in pre-kindergarten through second-grade classrooms. The focus on these age groups is crucial, as this is when the brain learns how to read, according to Shana Riehart, AUSD’s Language and Literacy Coordinator.
Board Vice President Ryan LaLonde suggested that since the SBAC results are released in June, parents may not always have the support or information needed to respond to the score report and help their children tackle identified reading issues over the summer break. AUSD Instructional Coach Kathleen Collins assured LaLonde that when school starts in the fall, parents have the opportunity to talk to their child’s new teacher about the scores, which also allows the teacher to get a head start in identifying focal students.
Next, Scuderi introduced the “Mississippi Miracle” model, which AUSD may consider adopting, as one example of a series of educational changes that has proven successful in producing the largest literacy gains nationwide. Led by the State of Mississippi’s Department of Education, the model focuses on the “science of reading” coupled with statewide teacher development, frequent assessment and screening of students, and additional support through extra instruction or literacy programs when needed.
Scuderi walked through several components of the Mississippi model and offered progress notes on how AUSD initiatives align with each one. For example, AUSD has adopted a new Literacy Framework and is in the process of adopting a new ELA curriculum that is aligned to the “science of reading,” which focuses on phonics, fluency, and vocabulary comprehension. Teachers will undergo professional development ahead of its rollout. Furthermore, AUSD assesses students three times per year and the district adopted a new Early Reading Difficulty Screener in early October to identify students in need of intervention.
Notably, student retention was a measure that Scuderi and staff were reluctant to adopt for AUSD, as the district deems it a last resort. In Mississippi, third grade students would be held back for one year if they could not pass a year-end literacy assessment. Scuderi expressed a desire to focus on preventive measures instead, since student retention comes with negative social stigma and could result in a “disproportionate number of students of color and mulitilingual learner students retained.”
“Investing in early childhood education gives better results by third grade, rather than relying on retention,” added Tanya Harris, Director of Elementary Education.
Finally, Harris and Riehart walked through a series of future commitments in K-2 literacy grounded in teacher feedback and AUSD’s new Literacy Framework. These commitments, sorted into a two-by-two matrix based on level of impact vs. time and resources required, include several measures already underway along with new measures AUSD should pursue. Staff underscored the importance of this work, noting that “88% of students who struggle with reading at the end of first grade will continue to struggle in fourth grade” without sufficient intervention.
“You really need to have really strong teaching and teachers that are committed to this effort because it sounds super intensive,” said Trustee Jennifer Williams. “We really are lucky to have teachers that are committed to this specific kind of work.”
Clerk Heather Little suggested, “I’d love to hear from some of the teachers who are actively doing this, hearing how they’re involved with this, and what their experiences are. They are the boots on the ground, they are the ones we are counting on, and they are the ones who are doing the heavy lifting. I’d love to give them an opportunity to be here with us in this fishbowl as we’re having this really important conversation.”
Ken Der is a contributing writer for the Alameda Post. Contact him via [email protected]. His writing is collected at AlamedaPost.com/Ken-Der.
