Canton gets PSSA results

BY ERIC HRIN

With Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) achieved overall and progress made at the elementary level, Canton Area School District has reason to celebrate as a result of its performance on the 2008-09 Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) testing.

The good news is that, for the sixth consecutive year, Canton Area School District overall has achieved AYP since its warning status in 2003.

And Canton Elementary School has achieved AYP status after being in warning status last year.

The scorecard, however, wasn't perfect, and the district is facing a challenge at the high school level.

Canton Junior-Senior High School did not achieve AYP at the high school level due to a math subgroup's performance, district superintendent Matt Gordon said. The high school is now in warning status.

The target for the "economically disadvantaged" subgroup was not achieved at the high school for mathematics, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) Web site.

Gordon noted that students in this subgroup can also appear in other subgroups, such as the special education subgroup. As a result, improvements are being sought not just for the economically disadvantaged subgroup, but for students in all areas, he said.

"We're not focusing on any one particular subgroup because we know that kids appear in all different types of subgroups…so we're saying, 'let's improve performance for all students,'" he said. "Then we know we're going to make sure we provide additional instruction and resources to the targeted students by implementing it district-wide and school-wide."

Gordon said the district is happy about the elementary school achieving AYP again, but he noted that the thresholds that must be met are increasing next year.

The district has charted a course for student achievement, which it hopes will allow students to meet those thresholds.

Gordon noted that the district is trying to be pro-active rather than reactive to the student scores.

He said that the district is implementing a balanced achievement model of improvement for every student.

"We are training all our teachers to be consistent and pervasive in the Learning Focused Model of School Improvement utilizing proven instructional strategies to help students learn more effectively," he said. "We analyze data to assess strengths and areas in need of improvement especially in terms of subgroups. We utilize ongoing assessments such as AIMSweb and 4-sight to monitor student progress throughout the school year so that teachers can adjust their instruction based upon student performance. Our teachers differentiate the instruction so that every student is able to learn more effectively."

He continued, "We are implementing a standards based curriculum, so that the time allotted for specific standards based units by teachers and the sequence in which the units are presented to the students is prioritized. We are using more graphic organized charts and visually enhanced learning maps so students learn more effectively. We are spending more time on extended thinking activities so that students can express their knowledge in a meaningful and authentic manner."

Gordon said a goal in Canton is to make sure that all students learn the essential elements of the state curriculum.

"Our goal is to provide professional development for all of our teachers so they are able to provide every student with effective instructional strategies to facilitate learning. Our final goal is to provide extended thinking assignments so that student learning is connected and longer term."

"We are implementing these identified items that we do have direct control over in order to improve student achievement. Unfortunately, we can't control some of the other elements to improve student performance such as the lack of a state budget that funds the EAP tutoring program, the Accountability Block Grant to provide all day kindergarten, or the diminishing federally funded Title I Reading and Math programs."

Eric Hrin can be reached at (570) 297-5251; e-mail: reviewtroy@thedailyreview.com.