Some closing the gap

Hispanic, black students at handful of DPS schools score on par with whites

Nancy Mitchell, Rocky Mountain News

Monday, August 14, 2006

Students in a few schools across Denver are turning traditional achievement gaps upside down, with Hispanic and black children performing as well as - and in some cases, better than - their white classmates on state reading and math exams.

At Dora Moore School in the diverse Cheesman Park neighborhood near downtown, the 38 Hispanic test-takers in grades three through five last spring scored as well on state reading exams as their 39 white classmates. A single percentage point separated the group.

In contrast, the districtwide reading gap for Hispanic and white children in those grades was 42 percentage points on a 100-point scale, with white children doing better.

At the Polaris Program at Ebert, a school for gifted and talented students in central Denver, black children edged out their white classmates in math on the 2006 state exams. All of the black students scored proficient in math, compared with 97 percent of white children.

"We want the diversity," said Polaris Principal Diana Howard. "We look at the hearts of kids, not the color of their skin."

A Rocky Mountain News analysis of state test results released earlier this month shows wide achievement gaps by ethnicity still exist in many Denver schools. Districtwide, white students as a group outperform their black and Hispanic classmates in every grade and subject.

But pulling apart those district totals reveals schools - Teller Elementary in Congress Park near downtown and Asbury Elementary near the University of Denver, for example - where all kids are performing well.

It also found schools where strong overall performance masks wide gaps among students. That includes Morey Middle School, where 81 percent of white students were proficient in math compared with 22 percent of black students.

And it includes East High School, where 89 percent of white students in grades nine and 10 were reading at grade level compared with just 43 percent of their Hispanic classmates.

"Here, and across the country, there are examples of schools where there is no achievement gap," said Denver Public Schools Superintendent Michael Bennet, "which is all the proof we need to know it's possible to close it."

Making the cut

A handful of schools emerged in the News analysis as success stories in closing the gap.

That means they met three criteria: at least 15 test-takers of black or Hispanic and white ethnicity; black-white or Hispanic-white achievement gaps of 10 percentage points or less on a 100-point scale; and at least half of each ethnic group scoring proficient or advanced on state reading and math tests.

Some schools were tossed from the study right away. Bryant-Webster K-8 in northwest Denver typically scores well on state tests but had fewer than 15 white or black test-takers last spring, making gap comparisons impossible.

Other schools, such as Montbello High, were cut later. The school in far northeast Denver had some of the smallest achievement gaps among city high schools. But no ethnic groups were achieving 50 percent proficiency.

That left schools such as Asbury, Grant Ranch, Polaris, Steck and Teller, all elementaries, that were successful in closing the gap in more than one subject. KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy was the only middle school to reach that bar; no high schools did.

"I just look at all kids as being able to achieve," said Asbury teacher Sharon Napolitano. "I set high expectations and I don't change them."

Napolitano could have spent last school year lamenting a class that topped out at 36 fifth-graders. Instead, she led a team of third-, fourth- and fifth-grade teachers who met twice a month to closely monitor their students' progress and target their instruction.

"We would each come to meetings with the skills we wanted to teach, a list of our kids, and talk about the strategies we could use," she said. "Then we would talk about what kind of student work are we going to see and bring to the meetings to show they're successful."

Finding what works

Interviews with Napolitano and other staff members at the successful schools revealed some common strategies, including:

• Team teaching. Teachers split duties and teach their best subjects. One first-grade teacher will teach math and science, for instance, while the other handles literacy and social studies. It allows teachers to specialize in subjects and encourages them to share information about their students.

"The specialization really helps," said Teller Principal Karti Lyons, "and it helps bring the teachers together collaboratively."

• Differentiated instruction. Using different instructional strategies to reach different kids. T. Jason Martinez, former Dora Moore principal and now a DPS instructional superintendent, made this a training emphasis for his teachers. "We tried to fill our instructional bag of tricks with as many different opportunities as possible to help students be successful," he said.

• Using student data. Not just testing students more, but using the results to change instruction. It's figuring out which kids get it, which do not and how to help those who don't.

One of Napolitano's strategies at Asbury is using quick and frequent individual reading tests. Every student gets a goal - read faster, for example - after each test. "Every student should be reading with a goal in mind," Napolitano said. "There should be a purpose."

At Grant Ranch Elementary in southwest Denver, Principal Sandy Blomeyer asks her teachers to be specific about their own classroom goals, not just say 80 percent of kids will achieve proficiency.

"I want them to say, out of 25, five kids are going to do this, four kids are going to do this," she said. "Instead of percentages, you're putting it into numbers and you're identifying each kid's weaknesses."

Different approaches

Some successful schools also cite unique strategies.

At Polaris, art is an emphasis and the school will offer ballet and hip-hop dance this fall.

At Teller, Lyons and her staff offer an intensive - and expensive - intervention program to help ensure all kids grasp the fundamental skill of reading. The program also made Teller a success in closing achievement gaps by income. A News analysis last year found Teller led the district in teaching kids from poor backgrounds.

"Regardless of income, regardless of ethnicity, it works," Lyons said. "The issue I keep struggling with is the funding of the program, going outside and getting that extra help."

Other principals are trying to figure out how to close gaps by ethnicity.

"We are aware that we are missing the boat with our African-American kids," said Cari Riedlin, principal of Lowry Elementary, which has the district's largest gap among black and white children in math.

One strategy will be an interest inventory of every student. Teachers will tap into those interests and use them to motivate kids in the classroom.

"We're taking the approach that if the child is underachieving, regardless of their color, we're going to find their strengths and tack onto those strengths," Riedlin said.

Tackling gaps

Principals at two of the city's higher-performing high schools also are tackling their gaps. Progress is slow.

East High School had the largest gaps of any high school in the News analysis. Only George Washington High, another high-performing school, had a larger gap in one ethnicity in one subject. Its black-white gap was largest in math.

Washington Principal Mario Williams can point to strong gains among all his students on the 2006 state tests.

"It still begs the conversation, why is there still a gap?" he said. "We've got to bring the community in and we've got to get people talking about it . . . It's not the kids' fault they're coming to school unprepared."

East Principal Kathy Callum, like Williams, can point to a number of strategies being used to close the gaps. At East, that includes putting all freshmen in an honors geography class. The idea is to let all students experience an advanced class and tempt them to take more of them.

East student Nia Lewis said it is too soon to tell if the efforts are working. Still, Lewis, who is black, and her older sister, Nicole, can see a change.

"When I was at East, counselors tried to dissuade me from taking certain classes," typically advanced classes, said Nicole Lewis, a junior at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

Nia said she took all "X" - or accelerated - classes as a freshman and plans a similar schedule this year as a sophomore.

"Teachers do encourage you to take X classes now," she said. "It's starting to change."

mitchelln@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5245 Internet site developer Ivo Majetic contributed to this report.