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Gap Closure Project

Gap-closing projects as varied as school districts

Kentucky School Advocate
April 2018

By Madelynn Coldiron
Staff writer

The seven school districts participating in KSBA’s Gap Closure Project have distinct differences – in geography, demographics and population, so it’s no surprise that the programs they have launched as part of this work are diverse and far from boilerplate.

From trauma-informed instruction and preschool expansion to projects aimed at English language learners and struggling readers, the projects in those districts were launched in January.

Paducah Independent school board members Felix Akojie (left) and James Hudson explain how they worked with a group

of middle school students as part of the district’s Gap Closure Project during a session at KSBA’s annual conference.

“We have had amazing support in what we’re doing in this plan,” said Christian County school board member Susan Hayes (pictured below), a member of her district’s gap closure team, which created a project to boost the number of students in underrepresented groups taking advanced coursework.

The programs aimed at closing the achievement gap are part of the work the seven participating districts did through KSBA’s Gap Closure Project. The project, funded through a Gates Foundation Grant via the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence, emphasizes the role of the school board in addressing these gaps. It is focused on enhancing both board awareness and public will to close the achievement gap, said Jacqueline Pope-Tarrence, who coordinates KSBA’s Equity Cadre, which provided expertise for the Gap Closure Project.

The district strategies were developed after teams from each of the districts studied data from the state education department showing achievement gaps across groups of students in areas that included reading and math, kindergarten readiness, college and career readiness, and graduation rate. Based on that information, each group identified three top issues and created an action plan, Pope-Tarrence said.

While the gap project involved seven school districts – Boone, Christian, Jefferson and Mercer county systems; and Frankfort, Covington and Paducah independents – the issue is one in which all school boards should be involved, she noted.

“We shouldn’t be talking about a one-time or once-a-year report,” she said. Strategies for school boards include promoting equity awareness, defining district initiatives using assessment data, developing a district equity policy and receiving monthly equity updates.

A clinic at KSBA’s annual conference last month outlined the Gap Closure Project and spotlighted the work of two of the districts.

Christian County school board member Susan Hayes reviews her district’s Gap Closure Project, which focused on boosting participation in advanced courses.

The Christian County Schools project aims to increase by 15 percent the number of 11th- and 12th-graders from traditionally underserved populations who are taking advanced coursework. The team determined that the ACT was one obstacle to this group achieving college and career readiness, so all freshmen are now taking the ACT as practice. The team also identified 20 students at each of its two high schools for receiving additional help, including after-school ACT tutoring and using guidance counselors to help work with the students and their parents on enrolling in dual-credit classes.

“Some of our students at risk are from a population still trying to meet their basic needs,” Hayes said. “The last thing they’re thinking about is getting their kid to college.”

She said the district also is working with Hopkinsville Community and Technical College on scheduling dual-credit classes during the day so students at one of the high schools can use district transportation to get there.

In Paducah Independent, the district’s gap team focused on student voice and community voice. The latter involves forming a community advisory council of stakeholders as a more effective way of conveying information about the district, Assistant Superintendent Will Black said. “We were trying to figure out a more effective way to get the word out on things that we’re doing and help our parents and other stakeholders really connect with those things,” he said.

The student voice “was really lacking in our district,” Black said. That phase of the gap project is aimed at determining what minority students feel are the roadblocks that they face in school and then analyzing that information. The team randomly selected 20 middle school students to meet with a Title I counselor and board members James Hudson and Felix Akojie – with no teachers or administrators – to talk about those roadblocks.

The students “were open, they were honest. They were comfortable” talking with the three adults, Hudson said. Black said the district will continue to hold these focus groups at every grade level.

How school boards can help with gap closure

Other gap projects
Boone County Schools’ plan creates an English learners Newcomer Language Immersion Academy for eighth- through 12th-graders, aimed at closing the gap in this group of students. The district’s gap team describes it as providing “an equitable, welcoming and respectful learning environment.”

Covington Independent’s project zeros in on the reading achievement gap at its Ninth District Elementary School. Its goal is to increase the percentage of students in the identified gap group scoring proficient or distinguished in reading from 34 percent to 44 percent by 2019.

For its project, Frankfort Independent is providing staff with training in trauma-informed instruction to better assess gap students, reduce their achievement gap, and boost both achievement and social well-being.

Mercer County School’s team devised a two-pronged project. One focused on providing midday preschool transportation as a way of removing a barrier for at-risk students who could not attend preschool, and thereby raising their academic achievement prior to kindergarten. The other prong provided funding after-school transportation for another group of students: those in K-12 Extended School Services. Those students are getting both additional instruction and a meal after school through this project.

As a way of reducing the achievement gap among student groups, the Jefferson County district gap team is working on creating a sense of belonging in some elementary schools, aimed at fostering conditions for academic improvement for all students.