SMMUSD elementary schools placed on Program Improvement
Despite exceeding the achievement goals set by the California government, four elementary schools in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District (SMMUSD) have been put on Program Improvement (PI) because they did not meet the Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) targets set by the federal government in the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, emphasizing again what many teachers say are the statute’s unrealistic measures of education.According to Irene Gonzalez, principal of McKinley Elementary, one of the schools put on PI, this means that the schools will be monitored and assisted in meeting their growth targets.“I think what’s challenging is we’re on program improvement, but we’re also a California Distinguished School, so it’s really tough because through the years we’ve had so much success, but with No Child Left Behind, the bar keeps getting set higher and higher so that it becomes much more difficult to get there,” Gonzalez said.According to Gonzalez, diverse schools where 35 percent or more of the students are eligible for free or reduced lunch are given Title I funds from the government, and then AYP targets that become incredibly hard to reach. If they don’t reach the targets for more than two years, the schools are subject to a number of sanctions. One of the first sanctions is a mandatory redistribution of 20 percent of the schools’ Title I funds for student tutoring.“I think it’s a great thing to have this money to help our students, because we don’t have all of the fund-raising opportunities that some schools have,” Gonzalez said. “What’s tough is that with all this money comes a lot of accountability. We all think schools should be accountable, but the punishments that are given out to schools don’t make sense. We should be supporting our schools, not punishing them.”According to SMMUSD Director of Educational Services, Maureen Bradford, growth targets are set up for each individual student demographic subcategory. When any subgroup doesn’t meet its growth target, the entire school is put on PI.“Once schools are on [PI], it takes two years of meeting all growth targets to leave it,” Bradford said. “By the 2013-2014 school year, schools will be expected to test at 100 percent proficiency.”Some find the increasing growth targets stipulated by NCLB to be nearly impossible to reach.“I think it’s a great goal to have 100 percent proficiency, but it’s flawed, because these targets are very difficult to meet with the problems we are working with. They can’t be fixed in such a short amount of time,” Gonzalez said.According to the California Department of Education, 71 percent of the 6,209 schools receiving Title I funds are on PI. That number is expected to increase after the 2013-14 school year, at which point 100 percent of students are expected to be proficient.According to Gonzalez, the law will place all schools that have any student who is not proficient in all subjects on PI, which allows the government to fire teachers and administers that they deem unable to teach adequately enough to meet the school’s AYP. This would essentially allow the federal government to come into any school and fire any teacher or administrator.“There is some work being done to see if the law can be amended or suspended, but currently, we’re not making our AYP,” Gonzalez said.Daniel BottittaStaff Writer