Report card shows FCSD needs plan to improve

Following the Arkansas Department of Education's release of school report cards and testing data, Forrest City School District administrators are reviewing the results and making adjustments to support academic improvement. Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum L’Kenna Whitehead said the district is using the latest data to identify strengths and areas for improvement while continuing several academic initiatives already underway. “There has been some positive movement in some of the schools,” Whitehead said. According to Whitehead, Forrest City High School improved from a F to a C, while the seventh and eighth-grade portion of Forrest City Junior High also improved from a D to a C. Lincoln Academy, which serves sixth-grade students and Stewart Elementary, continued to receive an F grade. However, Whitehead said student growth is one encouraging area in the latest data. “We are kind of at or a little ahead of the state in our growth areas,” Whitehead said. “In the area of achievement, we are behind the state.” Whitehead said continued growth should eventually translate into greater achievement. The district is also looking more closely at students who have historically performed near achievement benchmarks and determining what additional support could help them cross that threshold. “We're still doing a deep dive into root cause analysis to why things happened the way they did,” Whitehead said. According to Whitehead, a major focus this year is improving Tier 1 instruction, or the grade level instruction all students receive. Whitehead said improving daily classroom instruction should eventually reduce the number of students requiring additional intervention. “When we get a consistent stream of Tier 1 instruction, from year to year, we have less students that we have to intervene with and remediate because more and more students will have that skill set ingrained in their long-term memory, which will lead to better test scores,” said Whitehead. One new change this year, according to Whitehead, is that the district changed its literacy curriculum. Whitehead said the new curriculum more closely aligns daily instruction with the structure and expectations of the state assessment. “That structure and exposure to that on a daily basis should systematically improve students' performance,” said Whitehead. Whitehead said the district has also added i-Ready reading support and is considering a “Level Up Literacy” initiative aimed at developing a stronger culture of reading. The proposed program would track books and words read along with comprehension and recognize students, grade levels and schools for their progress. In addition, the district is also monitoring student progress more frequently. Whitehead said common formative assessments are generally administered about every two weeks, allowing teachers to determine whether students are meeting established goals and adjust instruction when needed. The district is also preparing to offer after-school tutoring and has plans to introduce student data cards that will allow students to track their own academic goals and assessment results. Whitehead said parents are among the district's most important partners in improving achievement. “We're here to serve their children and their parents to make sure that students are learning,” he said. Looking ahead, Whitehead said the district wants to maintain the progress already made while improving schools that have lower ratings. “We don't want to see any regression,” he said. Whitehead said he would like schools currently rated C to remain at that level or improve and see the district's F-rated schools move upward. He would also like FCSD to approach or achieve an overall C rating by this time next year. “We want to make sure we're doing day-to-day things right,” Whitehead said. “We have to make sure the input is right to get the proper output.”

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