By:JOSEPH KELLARD
"We are very frustrated with parental involvement, or the lack thereof," said Steve Foster, president of the school board, at the first board meeting after scores for state-wide standardized tests of fourth- and eighth-graders were released last month.
While Foster called for greater parental involvement during his uncontested run for re-election to the board in 2002, the issue was raised again when both Superintendent Dr. Ed Price and Assistant Superintendent Dr. Rosemarie Bovino analyzed the test score data. Though 84 percent of fourth-graders at Francis X. Hegarty Elementary School met or exceeded the state standards, that was a decline of a 12.2 percentage points from 2003. And while 77 percent of eighth-graders at Lincoln Orens Middle School met or exceeded state standards, the total was 5.9 percentage points lower than last year.
In analyzing ways to improve students' performance, both Price and Bovino said the district will look more at its benchmark assessments, tests that are similar to the standardized tests given throughout the year to track student development and monitor areas teachers need to focus on.
One parent asked why the board wasn't more aware that fourth-graders were only at 39 percent proficiency in November, arguing that the board failed to do its job in monitoring the students' development. Ann Goldman, vice president of the board, said, "We cannot do any more than put the programs in place. ... We are not getting enough support from the community."
In part, the programs Goldman referred to were after-school, summer school and weekend extra-support services, such as the Saturday Academy. These are available for all children, whether or not they are performing at proficient status.
Echoing Goldman, Foster said, "We have funded every program to help these kids. ... We need more community support. More parental support."
In her analysis, Bovino pointed to parental involvement as the most important indicator of a child's educational success. "When parents get involved, the first area that improves is math, for whatever reason," Bovino said.
But Bovino indicated that students haven't taken advantage of the district's support services, citing as one example that attendance was down for Saturday Academies, particularly among those children who needed the assistance most. "Many of the kids who were not achieving well just never even came," Price told the Herald. "And many of those who did come, many of them came sporadically."
The district is also calling for increased professional development to work with "economically disadvantaged" students, with both Price and Bovino claiming that most data show that poorer children don't fare as well in school.
When another parent contended that other communities with students from lower-income families, such as Freeport, have maintained their test-score status or have done better than Island Park, Bovino said, "Economics are just one factor."
Prince said that the overall trend in Island Park in both fourth- and eighth-grade math scores has been upward, and he pointed out that in the eighth grade the decline in scores amounted to three students who didn't perform as well this year. He explained that a 1.2 or 1.3 percent difference in scores can mean as much as a five-percent difference for Island Park because of its relative small population. "When you have a population as small as Island Park's, the numbers really get blown out of proportion," Price said.
Price told the Herald that the board is made aware of the benchmark assessments by reports the district provides its members at each board meeting. He also noted that the 39 percent passing percentage on the benchmarks merely reflects what students know seven months before they take the standardized test, and that in that time teachers focus on areas where students need the greatest attention.
In the end, the district and board maintains that it is doing the most it can, but that it needs more parental assistance. "If we can't get the kids to come to the extra activities we provide after school, Saturdays or during the summer," Price concluded, "we're going to get them by hook or by crook, and we're then going to have to pull them out of other things and get them in school. And we will do this, because the kids need it. They are going to get the academic support."
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