Math 'Coaches' Will Come With High Price Tag

On the same night the Greenfield School Board rededicated itself to meeting the needs of students by adding counselors to the elementary level, it also decided to allocate a large chunk of money to math investigation coaches.

The addition of two elementary school Investigations coaches will reduce fund balance reserves by $280,000 over the next two years.

The staffing moves are designed to help students as the district continues to push toward the common core standards. The combination of the common core and the adoption of the Investigations program should help define the district’s math development strategies.

“(Investigations) is new to us, and it’s a way of learning math that helps teach kids how to be mathematicians themselves,” Interim Superintendent David Ewald said. “It’s thinking out loud in a lot of cases. Mostly, it’s about kids developing their own understand, asking themselves the right questions.

“It’s not radical anymore. It’s been judged as a very high quality program and it meets a lot of the (common core) needs. The way math was done – turn the next page, do the workbook – really doesn’t prepare kids for the expectations of the new assessments.”

Ewald said money from the fund balance would be used just once. He envisioned the new “coaches” becoming staff members in other teaching capacities down the road.