City school board OKs $1M in spending on programs
By Harold Gwin
The district has a two-year spending window in which to use the money.
YOUNGSTOWN — The city school board has approved spending about $1 million in federal-stimulus funds on programs related to academic intervention designed to improve student performance.
As it stands now, the city schools are scheduled to receive $8.1 million in stimulus money that is basically unrestricted, except that it must be spent on academic- intervention efforts.
It’s only a two-year funding window, said Treasurer William Johnson, explaining that the money must be spent within a two-year time span that began with this school year. Stimulus funds are scheduled to expire after that point, he said.
The district is under pressure to improve student performance on state achievement exams and the Ohio Graduation Test. Youngstown dropped into academic emergency on its 2009 state local report card, the lowest academic ranking.
Superintendent Wendy Webb has said she believes the district can use the stimulus money to the advantage of its students, despite the two-year funding limit. The financial support can help Youngstown “spring forward” with efforts to build the graduation rate, improve test scores and more, she said.
Beverly Schumann, administrative assistant to the superintendent, said the district is focusing on two future areas with the federal money.
One involves using teachers as tutors or academic consultants for students in extended-day programs targeting the fifth and sixth grades. Test-results data show that fifth grade is where the most attention is needed, she said.
The second deals with professional development as it relates to student-based instruction, she said.
When the state local report card was released in August, Webb said the Ohio Department of Education already had been in Youngstown, reviewing its academic plan and curriculum, a process that involved visits to all of the city schools.
The ODE team found that although Youngstown’s goals are aligned with the state’s education standards, some of what is being taught in individual classrooms isn’t, she said.
The professional-development segment will address that issue, she said.
One specific program that hasn’t been presented to the school board but likely will be funded with federal-stimulus money is the creation of after-school “homework centers” to be staffed by district teachers in the city’s public libraries and community centers.
The program, focusing on reading and math, should be up and running by mid-November or early December, Schumann said.
Participating teachers will be paid an hourly rate of $22.05 for their services, based on their current contract, Johnson said.
Another upcoming program will be the use of “data coaches” in every school, Webb said. The district has the data from state tests last year and now has to show how the classroom instructional response is changing to meet the shortfalls shown in the data, she said.
Anthony Catale, school board president, said the district must make careful use of the stimulus funds.
He noted that some of the projects already approved involve the hiring of consultant services. Every effort must be made to ensure that those contracts are producing effective results in terms of helping students improve academically, he said. Those that fail that goal should be eliminated, he added.
gwin@vindy.com
THE BREAKDOWN
$240,000: To launch a revamped Governor’s Initiative program that will target fifth-grade boys and girls, focusing on academic and behavioral intervention.
$211,502: To Youngstown State University for academic intervention and support services for students enrolled in Youngstown Early College.
$203,400: To Simplified Solutions for Math for professional development of proven strategies for standard-based lessons and buy instructional materials for grades 5-9.
$116,000: To Learning Plus Associates to buy “Standards Plus” lesson-supplement material for teachers in grades 5-9 and professional development for implementation.
$72,500: To ON TASC Inc. to assist in the formulation and writing of the district’s strategic plan for education and to various consultation services. ON TASC also will get $35,000 in district general-fund money as part of that contract to cover library consulting services.
$58,000: To Karns Consulting Inc. to provide leadership strategies for principals.
$20,000: To hire consultants for English as a second language to develop instructional and logistic goals for the district.
$12,000: To hire a parent consultant to review the district’s Parent Group and develop a plan to design courses for parents and programs to increase parental involvement.
Source: Youngstown city schools