Schools using improvement grants to raise the educational bar

SUNNYSIDE, Wash. -- Toni Castillo remembers her first day of high school when an administrator told the new ninth-graders to look to their left and right.

Half those kids, he said, were unlikely to graduate.

"We kind of got ourselves in a hole," Castillo said. "I think we hadn't seen success in a long time. The culture around here was 50 percent graduation rate. We didn't know anything different."

Now they do.

In June, Sunnyside High School graduated its largest class in the past 10 years. Castillo, a 17-year-old standout swimmer who wants to become a doctor, was among the 326 graduates.

When she was a freshman, her school's on-time graduation rate was a dismal 49.9 percent. While the exact percentage for the class of 2011 won't be finalized until October, school officials expect it will be well above 65 percent.

Improving the graduation rate is among the school's targets under the School Improvement Grant program -- part of the federal government's biggest one-time investment in public schools.

By employing a new series of rigorous strategies, the program aims to turn around the country's persistently low-achieving schools -- those in the bottom 5 percent in each state.

Of 29 Washington schools selected for the grants, seven are in the Yakima Valley.

So far, students, local administrators and teachers say the improvement has been profound -- achieved by investing heavily in strategies to turn around their academic reputations.

In Sunnyside, additional study time is held at lunch for students falling behind. Several Yakima schools started a week earlier in the fall and ran a week later in the spring.

All schools require teachers to spend more time collaborating and analyzing student performance.

And in some cases, new principals are being brought in to lead the changes.

In Washington, 47 schools fell in the low-achieving category last year -- including a dozen in the Yakima Valley.

Three of the schools selected for the grant program are in Yakima: Adams Elementary School, Washington Middle School and Stanton Academy; and two are in the Lower Valley, Grandview Middle School and Sunnyside High School.

Recently, two schools were added: Wapato Middle School and Valley View Elementary School in Toppenish.

As much as 18 months into the program, the schools have been adjusting improvement plans, hiring consultants and paying teachers for increased instruction time.

"We've been pushed to a level we've never been as students, as a staff," said Caleb Oten, a math teacher at Sunnyside High School. "I'm exhausted. At Christmas, I was exhausted. We're all tired. But I hope and pray this is going to pay off. And I think it will."

Cece Mahre, associate superintendent for teaching and learning at the Yakima School District, agrees the change has been profound.

"This is huge. ... It's a whole different mind-set," Mahre said. "It's much more focused. It's much more intentional."

State and federal education officials are demanding dramatic improvement at School Improvement Grant schools, but large numbers of immigrants, and high levels of poverty and migrant students present extra challenges in the Yakima Valley.

Still, local school officials say the SIG's new strategies can bring meaningful change.

They point to the sheer amount of money -- $50,000 to $2 million per school per year for up to three years -- as one of the biggest factors in improvement. They also list accountability: Teacher evaluations are now tied to student performance.

State and federal education officials are monitoring progress far more than previous improvement efforts, said Rick Cole, Sunnyside superintendent.

"It is going to be successful. It is going to raise the bar," he said.

It already has, according Sunnyside graduate Joyanna Bardell, 18.

"I don't see specifically where the money goes," she said. "But I do see multiple examples of change in the school. It's been constantly shifting, and it's been positive shifting."

Castillo points to new principal Chuck Salina as the chief instigator of change.

"There's no question who it is," she said. "I remember (junior) year having just a couple of kids in class. Half the class would be skipping."

That changed last year.

"You could definitely tell" a difference, she said. "There are more kids here all the time."

Among the other changes at Sunnyside High School:

* Four hours were added to the school week for students.

* Five, including an hour of professional development, were added for teachers.

* Class periods are longer. Students take five 75-minute classes per trimester compared to six 55-minute classes per semester.

* Students with a D or F in any class are required to report for "Grizzly Time" -- 20 extra minutes of study time at lunch. Students earning Cs or better enjoy a 50-minute lunch period, rather than 30 minutes.

* Off-campus lunch -- once a right for upperclassmen -- now has to be earned through attendance, grades and keeping campus clean. The privilege is either earned by the entire junior or senior class, or not at all.

"It was a hard transition," Bardell said. "But I really admire the administration for stepping up and enforcing that. They set the standard high. It was a paradigm shift."

But, Castillo said, "I'm not going to lie: The first couple of months here, it was like a prison."

Under the SIG program, officials must pledge to change the school in one of four ways: shut it down and send students to higher-achieving schools; replace the principal and half the staff; allow a charter school operator or other outside manager to take over -- which isn't allowed under state law -- or transform the school by using a variety of strategies prescribed by the federal government.

Nationwide, most schools opt for the transformation model, including the seven in the Yakima Valley.

Strategies include improving instruction, adding learning time, parent involvement and outreach and replacing the principal -- unless the principal has been there less than three years. The principals at Adams Elementary, Washington Middle and Sunnyside High schools had to be replaced.

Teachers are now spending more time analyzing test scores and other data to monitor student progress and see specifically where they are struggling.

"They were already doing this, but at a different level," Mahre said. "It's really been racheted up. ... The big kahuna will still remain the state assessment."

To aid students falling behind at Sunnyside, there is an optional after-school program offering extra help for 50 minutes three days a week.

There's a new motto on campus, too: "Together we will."

So far, so good, Salina said.

"The signs are promising," he said. "The kids want this to work as much as we do. They knew we could be better. We changed what was expected of them.

"Is it stressful? Yes. This certainly is a test of what we've read and researched and challenged. How do you make it real in practice?"

With the grant, Salina said, "We've got the time. We've got the resources."

The bulk of the grant money has gone to teachers' salaries, paying them for their extra hours.

Money is also spent on transportation to get students to school during the extended academic year, on new curriculum and hiring new staff members and outside consultants, particularly at Grandview Middle School.

"What got us here isn't going to get us there," said that school's principal, Jack Dalton. "We had to look outside to get something a little different.

Boosting math scores is the main focus at his school, where students doubled the amount of time in math class. About 90 percent of the nearly 800 students are in some kind of math intervention. They also got new math books.

"It just feels like we're getting more," said 13-year-old Melissa Ramos, who is starting ninth grade in Grandview. "The math classes seem more focused on your needs."

Dalton calls the grant -- and all the requirements that come with it -- "a once in a lifetime" opportunity.

And he says he feels the pressure: "We don't want to mess it up."

Before the grant money came in, Grandview Superintendent Kevin Chase said, "I think people felt defeated. When you're on a tight budget, there's not a lot of things you think you can do."

The additional funding, he said, "allows you to dream and think about solutions to problems that are not available if you don't have the funds available. "

Teachers know they're on the spot, he said.

"They're teaching full days. They're getting professional development. They're changing their practice. How much more can you do?" Chase said. "It's difficult."

Valley View Elementary School in Toppenish and Wapato Middle School are just starting the Student Improvement Grant program. Their goals are similar: Improve student test scores.

Among other strategies, Valley View plans to lengthen the school year by 20 days; extend the school day by an hour; hold a 10-day teacher boot camp, hire an improvement instructional coordinator and a math coach.

At Wapato Middle School, plans include adding three or four individualized teacher coaching sessions per month with an emphasis on boosting math and reading scores. That's also the goal at Adams, one of Yakima's lowest-achieving schools in one of the city's poorest neighborhoods.

Principal Lee Maras likes what he sees. There's no opting out. If a student doesn't know the correct answer, the teacher works with him or her, continually coming back to the student until he or she comes to the right conclusion.

"Right is right," he said, watching from the back of the room. "You can't give a half-you-know-what answer. It has to be the real deal."

Language development is an emphasis at Adams, where more than half the students are learning to speak English. Maras said. According to recent rounds of district testing, it's working.

"We're more to the middle of the pack, no longer at the bottom," Maras said.

Getting there has been "exhausting," admits Jayme Darden, a fourth-grade teacher at Adams.

Twenty-six of her 29 students were English Language Learners this last spring.

Not all are up for the challenge. A third of the grade-level teachers at Adams -- eight of 24 -- left the school prior to the start of the last academic year, opting not to take part in the strenuous SIG requirements, according to Maras. Instead, they sought assignments at other, non-SIG schools in the district.

At the same time, four teachers -- including Darden -- followed Maras from his previous post as principal at McKinley Elementary to Adams in order to be part of the challenge.

Like his teachers, Maras feels the pressure.

"I never felt the responsibility like I feel it now or the accountability like I feel it now," he said. "I love that. I love the pressure. That's why I'm here. This is a pressure cooker. This is very stressful.

"We're kind of creating a blueprint for the district," Maras said. "The money allows us for time and opportunity to create more focus. This is a system change."

School snapshots

The federal government has allocated $3.5 billion for the School Improvement Grant program. To date, 56 schools from around the state applied for nearly $50 million in funding. Twenty-nine schools were selected, including seven in the Yakima Valley.

Here's a snapshot of the schools and the funding they will receive over three-year periods.

The Yakima School District was granted a total of $8 million for three schools, plus $2.1 million for the district as a whole.

Adams Elementary

Enrollment: 690

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 93.8%

Transitional bilingual students: 53.5%

Migrant students: 36.4%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Third-grade reading, 34%; third-grade math, 25.2%; fifth-grade reading, 23.6%; fifth-grade math, 33%.

Washington Middle School

Enrollment: 706

Hispanic: 87%

White: 7.2%

Other: 5.8%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 94.3%

Transitional bilingual students: 32.9%

Migrant students: 40.8%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Sixth-grade reading, 30.7%; sixth-grade math, 14.1%; seventh-grade reading, 35%; seventh-grade math, 17.9%; eighth-grade reading, 56.1%; eighth-grade math, 30%.

Stanton Academy

Enrollment: 393

Hispanic: 66.7%

White: 22.4%

Black: 5.4%

Native American: 4.8%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 77.4%

Transitional bilingual students: 19.8%

Migrant students: 27.5%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Tenth-grade reading, 40.2%; 10th-grade math, 5.6%.

Yakima School District

Enrollment: 14,552

Hispanic: 66.7%

White: 26.5%

Other: 6.8%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 80.6%

Transitional bilingual students: 26.5%

Migrant students: 19.7%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Third-grade reading, 53.3%; third-grade math, 35.3%; fifth-grade reading, 49.8%; fifth-grade math, 30.1%; 10th-grade reading, 63.6%, 10th-grade math, 24.7%.

Grandview School District was granted $2.5 million for Grandview Middle School and $690,000 for the district office.

Grandview Middle School

Enrollment: 707

Hispanic: 83.9%

White: 15.1%

Other: 1%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 80.3%

Transitional bilingual students: 18.2%

Migrant students: 14%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Sixth-grade reading, 37.1%; sixth-grade math, 17.3%; seventh-grade reading, 40.4%; seventh-grade math, 22.3%; eighth-grade reading, 56.9%, eighth-grade math, 16.5%.

Grandview School District

Enrollment: 3,532

Hispanic: 87.2%

White: 11.7%

Other: 1.1%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 77.6%

Transitional bilingual students: 29.5%

Migrant students: 19.2%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Third-grade reading, 47.1%; third-grade math, 35%; fifth-grade reading, 42.7%; fifth-grade math, 21.8%; 10th-grade reading, 56.7%; 10th-grade math, 13.3%.

Sunnyside School District was given $5.12 million for Sunnyside High School and $680,000 for the district office.

Sunnyside School District

Enrollment: 6,041

Hispanic: 88.5%

White: 9.6%

Other: 1.9%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 97.1%

Transitional bilingual students: 27.9%

Migrant students: 20.7%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Third-grade reading, 51.5%; third-grade math, 43.6%; fifth-grade reading, 49.9%; fifth-grade math, 46%; 10th-grade reading, 60.4%; 10th-grade math, 12.1%.

Sunnyside High School

Enrollment: 1,490

Hispanic: 85.3%

White: 13.5%

Other: 1.2%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 68.6%

Transitional bilingual students: 10.8%

Migrant students: 28.9%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Tenth-grade reading, 60.4%; 10th-grade math, 12.1%.

The Toppenish School District got $1.97 million for Valley View Elementary.

Valley View Elementary School

Enrollment: 423

Hispanic: 95.1%

Native American: 3.5%

Other: 1.4%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 100%

Transitional bilingual students: 67.8%

Migrant students: 36.4%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Third-grade reading, 37.2%; third-grade math, 25.6%; fifth-grade reading, 39.4%; fifth-grade math, 5.6%.

The Wapato School District was granted $2.75 million for Wapato Middle School.

Wapato Middle School

Enrollment: 771

Hispanic: 69.2%

White: 4.7%

Black: 0.5%

Native American: 23.7%

Eligible for free or reduced meals: 85.6%

Transitional Bilingual: 19.7%%

Migrant students: 23.3%

Passed the 2009-10 State Assessment tests: Sixth-grade reading, 28.8%; sixth-grade math, 25.5%; seventh-grade reading, 39.7%; seventh-grade math, 32.1%; eighth-grade reading, 34.5%; eighth-grade math, 23.8%.

-- Source: OSPI