An Evanston Township High School District 202 Board of Education official said the district faces a “crisis” in reading proficiency after staff reported a substantial increase in the forecasted number of incoming freshmen in need of reading intervention services at the high school next year.
The number of students enrolled in the high school’s freshmen Reading with Support course has more than doubled since the 2011-12 school year, according to a report presented to the board during a meeting Monday night.
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The number of students enrolled in the course is projected to jump from 101 students this year to 142 students when school begins next fall, according to the presentation from staff.
“What I’m seeing here is a crisis,” said Mart Metz, vice president of the District 202 board. “It seems to me you folks are treating it as a crisis.” He added that he hoped district staff would work with their colleagues in Evanston/Skokie School District 65 to tackle the issue “because this is pretty startling.”
District 202 Superintendent Eric Witherspoon said it behooves the high school to “reach back” to students in pre-high school grade levels by offering reading programs “and even thinking about a one book kind of approach where we’ll get all the incoming freshmen reading one book and utilize that book when they start transitioning into the high school in the fall.”
“Any time we have large numbers of students who are really lacking reading proficiency, we do have to really understand it is urgent to turn that around and we must operate with urgency,” he said. “Reading is the gateway to all learning — it correlates with all sorts of things.”
Students enrolled in the high school’s reading intervention course scored below the 40th percentile in reading on the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP), a computer-based assessment, in eighth grade, according to the report from staff.
The district began administering Renaissance Learning’s STAR reading assessment during the last school year to monitor the progress of students enrolled in the intervention program, said district reading specialist, Kiwana Brown. About 60 percent of the students tested last spring were at or above grade level or making expected improvements in reading, she said, while roughly 40 percent were not, according to the assessment results. Additionally, 48 percent of the students currently enrolled in the intervention course received no Ds, Fs, or not completed marks during their first semester at the high school, the report states.
To address the growing cadre of students coming into the district with lower reading levels, the district is revising the intervention course in time for the beginning of school next year, actively recruiting students for the high school’s summer reading course, making the issue a point of emphasis in discussions with District 65 officials and trying to incorporate reading into existing summer learning programs throughout the city, including scheduling reading time and visits to the city library as part of summer camp activities, said Scott Bramley, the district’s associate principal of instruction and literacy.
But there’s only so much that can be done for these students within an academic setting, he said, and the issue of reading proficiency is one “we really need to mobilize the community on.”
District 202 board member Monique Parsons called the presentation “depressing” and acknowledged a need to get the community involved in the solution. She also asked staff what the barriers are holding these students back from achieving success in reading.
Brown said circumstances in the home, absences, truancies and a lack of motivation can all contribute to the problem. She said she’s been in conversation with staff at other districts to brainstorm ways to motivate students in the classroom, particularly “males of color.”
“There are many factors that contribute to why students have these barriers and when they are in the high school, especially when they’re here and have experienced failure for so many years, they’re not motivated to put their best foot forward because their best foot has never been good enough,” Brown said.
In an interview following the meeting, the district’s associate superintendent for curriculum and instruction, Pete Bavis, said the projected enrollment for next year’s reading intervention course could decrease if some of these students test higher in reading later this year. Depending on the final tally, he said it’s possible staff will need more resources to assist these students. He said the district offers a humanities with support course in sophomore year for students still struggling with reading proficiency, but there are currently no similar courses offered for juniors and seniors.
Pat Savage-Williams, the board’s president, called the report “scary,” but she thanked staff for the detailed information presented.
“I appreciate all the work you’re doing,” she said. “This is a tremendous challenge but we’ve got so many bright, highly committed people working on this that I’m hopeful.”
Lee V. Gaines is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.