Tuesday, August 08, 2000
Reading program pays off
By Kristina Goetz
The Cincinnati Enquirer
More than 55 percent of the third-grade students in the Cincinnati Public Schools who attended a mandatory summer reading program passed the Ohio reading proficiency test.
The results, released Monday, are better than expected, school officials said.
“We're very pleased with the results,” said Terry Joyner, curriculum director. “The focus is not expecting a one-size-fits-all instructional model.”
Forty-two percent of Cincinnati Public Schools' second-graders and 20 percent of its third-graders had to attend summer school because of the district's new Third Grade Reading Guarantee. Students in the second and third grades who did not pass the state's reading proficiency test were required to attend.
The Third Grade Reading Guarantee is an effort by the district to get students reading at grade level before the state's Fourth Grade Reading Guarantee takes effect in the 2001-02 school year. The state will require students to read at fourth-grade level or be held back.
Brittany Price, a South Avondale Elementary School student, will proudly be a fourth-grader when class resumes. She first scored a 190 on the proficiency test; the cutoff score is 200.
She discovered Monday her retest score was 215.
“They were helping me do the best I could to pass to the fourth grade,” the 8-year-old said.
South Avondale Principal Cathy Lutts said she is pleased with the success of the program.
“We did really well,” she said. “Around 50 percent of our children passed and every one of them increased.”
Mercedes Bell, another South Avondale student, said she and her mother were screaming with joy when they found out Monday she scored 201.
“Something told me I was going to do it and I did it,” she said.
Third-graders were retested at the end of the five-week program, and those who still did not pass won't be promoted to the fourth grade without an exemption from their teacher and principal.
Students who attended summer school but received a score between 195 and 199 will have another chance to take the test Aug. 23. Of the 309 children who did not pass the test, 97 were just below the required score.
“That's a good 31 percent that are right at that edge,” Ms. Joyner said, adding that what it tells school officials is that intense, focused instruction does help.
Those students who did not attend summer school for a legitimate reason and scored between 185 and 199 will also be allowed to retest.
Because the reading guarantee is mandatory, those students who didn't attend for nonlegitimate reasons are considered truants, as they would be during the regular school year. The district is considering whether to cite their parents for not sending the children to summer school.
“I know that's one of the things we talked about, but I don't know how logistically that might happen,” Ms. Joyner said.
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