Two California middle schools that have been labled as failing are trying a new program that groups students by ability and focuses on each student's weaknesses for extra study:
"It's something new and exciting," Kennedy Middle School's co-principal Keith Acedo told about 30 concerned parents at the school Thursday night. "Our teachers were very impressed with the program, and are excited to bring it to Kennedy."
The program, ExCel (Excellence: A Commitment to Every Learner), identifies elementary students headed toward special education and focuses instruction in areas of a specific student's weakness more intensely than in areas of strength. The adaptation of ExCel is in response to the school's failure to meet state standardized test goals in two straight years, co-principal Talib Abdul-Kahabir said...
Under the model, the schools will set up part of the school day so students will work with other students at their academic level. Students at the lowest level will be in smaller groups, with more teachers and aides to help them.
During a semester, a student can be moved within the different levels depending on how the student is faring. Each student will have two English classes, back-to-back, to help the students improve the Language Arts portion of the standardized tests.
"The concept is a good idea," parent Ben Roman said. "The 90 minutes of reading and language arts a day is exactly what my son needs."
Here's an earlier article that describes ExCel's track record in more detail:
Hesperia Unified School District has attracted national attention with the success of its ExCEL program. The program, Excellence: A Commitment to Every Learner, is largely responsible for the rise in students' test scores on standardized tests and the four-year decline in students needing special education classes in the district, school officials said...
The latest admirers? The Marion County School District in Florida is in the process of implementing the program and 32 teachers and administrators spent Thursday and Friday touring Hesperia schools and talking with teachers...
Hesperia staff members detail their scheduling practices for the teachers and administrators. They also show them different models of the program...[which is]...designed to flex with different campuses and student populations...
The Hesperia Institute for ExCEL earns $5000 each time it trains another school in the process, and that, combined with its recent startup, is probably why there's not much (free) information available about it on the web. If anyone has inside information, I'd love to know more about the specifics of the program.
Posted by kswygert at October 17, 2003 01:44 PM