YOUNGSTOWN SCHOOLS Principals offer ways to raise scores

At Williamson Elementary, the number of fourth-graders passing portions of practice proficiency exams has jumped by as much as 24 percentage points.
By JoANNE VIVIANO
VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- When Youngstown City Schools board Vice President Tracey S.M. Winbush asked her for a "realistic wish list," Nancy Murray's answer came quickly.
The Hillman Middle School principal would like a bus -- just for Hillman.
"So when you don't come to school, I will go get you," she said.
Murray was asked the question during a presentation before the school board Tuesday. She and two other principals were asked to tell the boards ways they have been working to increase scores on state proficiency exams. In report cards released by the state Department of Education in January, the district met five of 27 goals, leaving it in academic emergency.
Murray said she has a core group of 18 pupils who were held back to repeat seventh grade this year. This group, she said, had more than two failing grades at the end of school last year. They refused to attend mandatory summer school, insisting that they would still be passed on to eighth grade.
Murray said no.
"We must take a stand if we're not going to leave anybody behind," she said. "Enough is enough."
The pupils now have volunteer teacher mentors and attend after-school programs. Several other projects have been initiated schoolwide, she said, including parent workshops and training in the behavior of special-education pupils.
Improving
At Williamson Elementary School, the number of fourth-graders who have passed portions of practice proficiency exams jumped by as much as 24 percentage points this fall, compared with when they were tested last spring, said principal Linda Gianoglio. This year, 62 percent of the pupils passed the reading portion of a practice exam, compared with 47 percent in the spring. The percentage jumped from 39 percent to 63 percent in math; and 43 percent to 63 percent in science.
Gianoglio said 27 fourth-graders are tutored by retired teachers who work four-and-a-half hours each day, using guidelines recommended by Youngstown State University professors.
Mary Ann Schulay, principal at Sheridan Elementary School, said scores are improving in her school through the use of a reading lab that assists at-risk pupils. On practice exams, 57 percent of fourth-graders, 79 percent of fifth-graders and 80 percent of sixth-graders have improved reading scores since Oct. 8.
Assessments of each child's reading performance -- showing them at, above or below their grade level -- has helped educators gear programs on a more individual basis, Schulay said.
Other action
In other matters, the school board:
* Requested that Superintendent Benjamin L. McGee schedule a meeting with three parents who complained that a "time-out room" at the Choffin Career Center alternative school is "worse than a prison cell," that children are confined there for lengthy amounts of time and that sometimes they are physically or mentally abused. McGee said the small, sparse rooms are in five schools, are used to confine children with behavior problems for short periods of time and offer a alternative to sending them home or calling police. The meeting will be held next month.
* Approved the district's five-year forecast showing a fund balance of $13.8 million in fiscal year 2003, $15.9 million in 2004, $7.8 million in 200 5 and $837,000 in 2006 and a deficit of $9.4 million in 2007.