Reading, Writing and Arithmetic

The will meet for the first time in the New Year on Thursday at 7 p.m. at the Havemeyer Building with several big monitoring reports on the agenda:

1. Curriculum Review – Physical Education, Step IIB 
2. First Reading, Monitoring Report E-003, Reading/Language Arts/Writing 
3. First Reading, Monitoring Report E-003, Mathematics

The district's recent focus on stagnating scores on standardized tests underpins the importance placed on these reports.

Monitoring reports are the main means of informing the board of the programs in place for the subject matter, progress against prior years' test results, specific management and governance issues identified and recommendations regarding the subject matter.

Monitoring reports normally entail three "readings" or presentations at three consecutive meetings to the board. Subsequent to the initial reading, the board and the public are given opportunities at the second and third readings to  question the report prior to the board formally accepting it. 

The district has struggled with how best to deal with test results which consistently have put Greenwich in the middle of the pack against comparable districts across the state.

The 2012-2013 Strategic Improvement Plan presented by Interim Superintendent Roger Lulow last September highlighted these core subjects as areas of focus for the district.

Among the 6 key issues to be addressed were the 1) recent two-year decline in writing scores as measured by the Connecticut Mastery Test in grades 3 through 8; 2) student achievement in reading and mathematics at the end of the primary grades (K-2) and 3) the fact that while outperforming students in similar districts from grade 3 to grade 8, the growth in mathematics and reading achievement of Greenwich students is lower from grade five to grade six.