Jefferson and Silvermine Win Academic Gain Award

Jefferson and Silvermine Elementary Schools are the recipients of the Lone Pine Foundation's Academic Gain Award. The schools took home top prizes at an awards ceremony held on Monday evening at UConn Campus in Stamford. They were selected from 151 schools in Fairfield County as having the greatest improvement in student achievement on the 2009 Connecticut Mastery Tests (CMT).

"This award is incredibly motivating and a tribute to our hard working staff," said Katherine Gallagher, assistant principal of Jefferson School which took home first place.

"We have been making steady gains and this year it really showed," said Ms. Gallagher. "It's great that someone is recognizing us.   I'm so excited for Norwalk and it just goes to show that every child can learn."

According to Ms. Gallagher,  several new teaching techniques have been put into place at Jefferson.  The amount of reading instruction given to students in 2nd and 3rd grades has doubled.  In addition,   students across each grade are regrouped into smaller work groups focusing on specific topics.  The school is building strong grade level teacher teams and allowing teachers to watch each other teach and learn from each other. 

At Silvermine, Prinicipal Ivette Ellis said that teachers are meeting every six days by grade level to monitor student progress. 

As winners of the Award every full-time employee at Jefferson Science Magnet School in Norwalk during the 2008-09 academic year will each receive $500. Every full-time employee of the 2nd place winning school, Silvermine Elementary School, will each receive $350.

"Our aim is to reward every single employee in the building, including the cafeterial and custodial staff, " said Lucy Ball, director of The Lone Pine Foundation. "We believe educating our children is a team effort and every single employee plays an important part in creating a learning environment."

According to Ms. Ball,  the Lone Pine Foundation together with Cambridge Education undertook statistical analysis of the Connecticut Mastery Test (CMT). The Lone Pine Foundation Advisory Board then selected a short list of the four most improved schools.

A team from the Lone Pine Foundation and Cambridge Education conducted full day site visits at each of the Finalist schools on the short list. The visits included interviews with the principals, students, teachers, and parents, as well as thorough reviews and evaluations of school portfolios – test data, student work samples, school improvement plans, and professional development plans.

"I was very impressed by the process," said Prinicial Ellis. "They took the time to look at the story behind the numbers."

Approximately 40 people attended the awards ceremony,  mainly principals, assistant principals teachers and parents from Jefferson and Silvermine.  No one from Norwalk's central office or any other elected official was present, according to Silvermine's PTO President Kerry O'Neill, which she said was "disappointing and disheartening."

"Mayor Finch of Bridgeport was there to congratulate two Bridgeport schools that received third and fourth place," said Ms. O'Neill.  "We need that kind of support and encouragement in Norwalk."

"One of the messages I took away from previous winners of the award is that we just have to keep working.  Our  families are going to come back when they see improvements like this, " said Ms. O'Neill referring to the fact that  Silvermine's enrollment is down 100 students over the last several years.

The Lone Pine Foundation, is a Connecticut-based private non-profit group funded by the employees of Lone Pine Capital LLC a Greenwich based hedge fund.  The foundation seeks to break the cycle of poverty through education. This is the third year that this award was given.  Last year, Jefferson was third place and Brookside was fourth.  No Norwalk schools were selected in 2007.

One of the goals of the Lone Pine Foundation Award is to collect effective teaching practices used at  winning schools as an example of best practice.  A list of these practices (listed below) was distributed at the awards ceremony.

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Effective Practices of the Finalist Schools:

Inspirational and Visionary Leadership: Principals inspire staff, parents and students to commit to their very clear vision for how the school will reach and sustain challenging goals for student academic and personal achievement

Data Analysis and Collaborative Leadership: Administrators and teachers work in collaborative leadership teams to analyze in great detail student assessment data in reading, math, science and writing to drive decisions and accelerate learning at individual, group, grade and school level.

Teacher Collaboration: Regularly scheduled grade and cross-grade meetings of teachers and support staff ensure the alignment of instruction and curriculum to data and enable the sharing and embedding of effective lessons and teaching strategies.

Accountability: Every teacher and specialist accepts accountability for every student's achievement and progress regardless of class or grade and consistently follows research-proven procedures for planning and delivering effective learning.

Use of Formative and Summative Data to Raise Achievement and Accelerate Progress: The whole faculty constantly uses and shares evaluation instruments and data to measure student achievement throughout the year, to target interventions and to drive instruction.

Flexible Targeted Grouping: The leadership team uses formative testing data to implement flexible and constantly changing classroom and cross-grade groupings for reading and math to target student specific academic needs and to ensure differentiated academic challenge. Intervention activities and extra academic time support all students and not just those who are not reaching proficiency levels.

Continuity for Accelerated Progress: Effective transition arrangements ensure that student achievement does not need to be reassessed at the start of each year. This enables teaching and learning to begin immediately. This year’s number one school also runs a summer preschool program to prepare incoming students for curriculum expectations. The full day kindergarten program has academic goals that are pre-tested, taught, and post-tested for mastery.

Self Assessments: Students know in reading and math the level they are working on and with their teachers they set academic goals. They also use rubrics to evaluate their daily work.

Personal and Social Development: There is strong focus on research-proven student learning and creating environments that support personal and emotional development alongside academic achievement.

Parent Involvement: Parents are welcomed as equal partners in their children's education and therefore support the schools in their work. Parents are provided specific information to know the child’s level of achievement and next steps for learning.

Community Partnerships: The support from community groups extends student experiences and enriches the curriculum both on and off-site.