In West Orange: Edison School Loses ‘Stigma’ Of Focus School Status

WEST ORANGE, NJ — Edison Middle School’s staff and students will no longer have to face the “stigma” of being a Focus School, according to its principal.

On Monday, West Orange Public School District officials announced that the New Jersey Commissioner of Education has notified them that Edison Middle School has met all the eligibility requirements to exit “Focus School” status.

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What’s a Focus School? According to the New Jersey Department of Education:

“Focus Schools comprise about 10 percent of schools with the overall lowest subgroup performance, a graduation rate below 75 percent and the widest gaps in achievement between different subgroups of students.”

In 2011, Edison Middle School, a middle school comprised entirely of sixth grade students and which serves the entire West Orange district, was identified as a Focus School by the state for showing a gap in achievement between two different subgroups of students.

According to West Orange school administrators:

“As [Edison] Principal Xavier Fitzgerald described, a subgroup represents 30 students or more. In 2011, there were 32 Asian students at Edison who were compared to the special needs and economically disadvantaged subgroup of over 200 students. Technically, Edison was 0.2 of a point away from not becoming a Focus School.”

West Orange school administrators said that to address the issue, during the 2011-12 school year, Fitzgerald and the team at Edison worked to improve time on task with teachers and the school switched to block scheduling. Class sizes were reduced and additional teachers were hired. A "balanced" literacy approach was examined for English Language Arts, and the transition from Everyday Math to Connected Math was strengthened.

Other district initiatives like benchmark testing and the implementation of the Marzano Model for teacher evaluation aided in the process, officials added.

Fitzgerald called the past six years “bittersweet,” and said that he was “happy that my staff doesn’t have to live under the stigma of being a Focus School any longer.”

“I would put my staff up against any staff at any school anywhere,” Fitzgerald said.

To read the letter from the State of New Jersey Education Department confirming Edison’s exit from Focus School status, click here.

• See related article: Hoboken School Goes Out-Of-Focus

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Photo: West Orange Public School District