Hermosa students are benefiting from an increased focus on writing programs and the use of “differentiated education” to augment their strengths and shore up their weaknesses, said educators who used the first annual “State of the Schools” address to detail the workings of the public schools.
City school board president Cathy McCurdy, the two campus principals and others described how the 1,300-student, K-8 district is doing more with less, as Sacramento continues to cut school budgets.
“We have to balance our budget, even if the state doesn’t,” said Angela Jones, the district’s business manager, during the hour-long address Wednesday evening at City Hall.
“Our test scores are phenomenal,” McCurdy said, pointing out a rise in the past few years in the students’ standardized academic test scores. “Despite budget shortfalls our scores continue to climb and climb and climb.”
Hermosa students continually score in the top 10 percent statewide in standardized academic tests, and remain in the top 10 percent when they are compared to other California schools with similar demographic profiles.
In the most recent round of testing, students at the second-through-eighth-grade Hermosa Valley School earned 937 out of a possible 1,000 points in the Academic Performance Index, which is the state’s main measure of how the schools are doing.
Students at the kindergarten-through-second grade Hermosa View School scored 951 out of 1,000.
The State of the Schools address preceded McCurdy’s last meeting as a member of the school board – for a second time. She had retired once from the board after 16 years, and then was appointed to replace Barbara Zondiros, who resigned in late 2009 because of an illness in her family.
McCurdy will be replaced by Patti Ackerman who, along with incumbent Lisa Claypoole, ran unopposed for two open board seats. To spare the expense of placing Ackerman and Claypoole on the Nov. 8 ballot, the board will swear the two in for their four-year terms at the next regular meeting, without a public vote.
McCurdy touched on the loss of academic programs in the district, which has come to count on parents and other private fundraisers to cover 8 percent to 10 percent of its $10 million annual budget.
Despite the fundraising, programs cut in the last few years include choir, after-school theater, class-size reduction in lower grades, a vice principal’s position, kindergarten-through-fifth-grade music, computer and technology aids, library hours and clerical hours.
“I really wish we could offer [students] more in the arts,” McCurdy said.
In addition to the program cuts, teachers and all other district staff have agreed to take five unpaid furlough days, representing a 3 percent cut in pay.
McCurdy praised a non-confrontational collective bargaining style used by district management and employees. Recent bargaining sessions have resulted in pay freezes and the furlough days.
“It may take a little longer…but we’re doing it together,” she said.
Patricia Escalante, the first-year principal of Valley School, spoke with relish of a “school-wide academic focus on writing” for which teachers attended four-day training sessions on their own time.
“Not only are students lifelong learners, teachers are lifelong learners,” she said.
“Teachers have reported huge shifts in the children’s confidence in writing,” she said, adding that she was looking forward to analyses of the program’s results.
Escalante told of a recent trip by eighth graders to Mira Costa High School, where they got to “live the life of a freshman” for a bit, and an upcoming outreach with Redondo Union High School.
Escalante also told of the “differentiated instruction” method, taught on both Hermosa campuses for about the last decade, which is designed to allow each student to fulfill the standard coursework, or move up to a more challenging level, on an assignment-by-assignment basis.
She said “you haven’t lived” until you’ve seen a student display a mastery of math by getting the answer to a problem, “turning to another person and explaining their thinking,” and then hearing other students tell how they arrived the same answer through a different mental route.
Escalante introduced four seventh-grade girls who formed a cheerleader squad after choosing a uniform style, “costing it out” and receiving training through Costa.
Sylvia Gluck, principal of View School, described an emphasis on teaching to state academic standards, the importance of extracurricular activities, and finding help for any students who begin to lag.
She spoke of the school’s accelerated reading program, in which kids can read what interests them and be tested on it, and other programs such as “bully blocker,” a garden club, and a “Caught in the Act” award.
