That was a quick two weeks since my last post! Check out the pictures below to get a sense of the exciting things that have happened in our schools since then! I hope you see what I see...students of all ages having FUN while learning!
Assessing student learning is an essential aspect of education, as it provides valuable data to districts, schools, families and students. The federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) and state law requires every school to administer annual tests in reading and mathematics to students in grades 3-8 and 10. In addition to meeting state and federal accountability needs, we use assessment data to identify areas of strength and areas for growth within our school communities so that we can make adjustments in curriculum and instruction, as well as in supports that will benefit our students.
The Maine Department of Education has partnered with NWEA (Northwest Educational Association) to provide students in grades 3-8 and 2nd year of high school an assessment for mathematics and reading. The NWEA Through Test offers a variety of embedded questions directly related to grade level standards, thus allowing full compliance with federal guidelines. The NWEA Through Test will serve as the official MEA (Maine Education Assessment) state level test.
The assessment is computer-based and adaptive, adjusting the difficulty level of the questions presented to the student based upon student response. Student achievement is measured both according to grade-level Common Core State Standards as well as according to a RIT score which allows for comparisons of academic growth across students and time.
Because NWEA also acts as our universal screener, we will continue to administer the NWEA-MAP Tests (Northwest Educational Association - Measures of Academic Progress) to students in grades K-2 and 9. These assessments are also computer-based and adaptive.
Students in grades 1-5 participate in fall, winter and spring testing (K winter and spring only).
Students in grades 6-10 participate in fall and spring testing. Individual schools will communicate testing dates.
While we encourage students to do their best, we also recognize that this assessment is an in-the-moment snapshot and not the final word on a student’s understanding or skill. That being said, a good night’s sleep and a healthy breakfast will go a long way toward ensuring a positive experience and outcome, and we appreciate your support in this regard.
If you have any questions about these assessments, please reach out to your school's principal to learn more.
A CONTINUED FOCUS ON MENTAL HEALTH - EXCITING UPCOMING COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES!
The safety of your children is our priority. We take safety procedures and protocols very seriously in the Gorham Schools and work diligently to ensure that our staff and students are well prepared in case of an emergency. We hold regularly scheduled safety drills, including fire drills, playground drills, and emergency drills. Following each practice drill, building staff members evaluate the effectiveness of the drill to determine if any adjustments need to be made to ensure our overall preparedness.
In 2019, we adopted some changes to the District’s Emergency Management Plan, specifically implementing a safety framework called A.L.I.C.E. ALICE is a research-based, proactive, options-based, empowering program for responding to a dangerous incident. ALICE is an acronym for Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate.
With regard to classroom messaging to students, as with years past we continue to keep this information developmentally appropriate and low-key. Students know that we regularly conduct emergency lessons for everyone’s safety; including evacuations during a Fire Alarm and locking down in the event of an active threat emergency. Using ALICE protocols is an integral part of this practice.
For our students and staff members, the biggest shift over the last 5 years has been that there is no longer only one response during a Lockdown (moving to a predetermined safe spot in the classroom and staying there). Instead, they now focus on the teacher for specific directions that may include a ‘shelter in place’ option, locking down and barricading a room, evacuating a space when safe to do so, or any number of other responses depending on the situation. Our staff are all trained to respond in a variety of ways, making a decision that will best ensure the safety of the students in their care.
In order for these actions to be met with success, our students at the Elementary Level are being coached to stop, look, listen and follow directions without questions in these variable situations.
Additionally, all staff members are trained annually in Emergency Preparedness Response situations, including using the ALICE Framework to make safety response decisions as needed in the moment, to reduce any risk to our students. During this year, all staff members in the Gorham Schools also participated in ALICE Scenario Trainings, as a refresher to reinforce their previous knowledge.
ALICE has been instrumental in changing the way we react in the case of emergency situations, with the greatest factor being that of empowering staff and students to make decisions in real time that make sense to ensure their safety and well-being.
If you were reading my previous blog post, you probably noticed that one of my goals for this coming year is to help the School Committee work through a process to determine how to most efficiently maneuver our schools through continued growth while acknowledging our current facilities and financial limitations.
In November of 2017 A report was presented to the Gorham School Committee that studied the potential +/- of moving away from our existing K-5 “Neighborhood Schools” configuration and back to the “Grade Level Schools” configurations that had previously been in place. At the time, and after having reviewed the report in its entirety, the School Committee voted to remain with the “Neighborhood Schools” configurations.
Since then, much has changed. We have gone through a Global Pandemic, our enrollments have stabilized, we have added two phases of modular expansions at Narragansett Elementary School (22 additional classroom spaes), and our special education costs (specifically for our specialized programs in the area of Autism) have increased significantly to name just a few.
During the FY 24 budget development process the School Committee requested to re-look at the “Grade Level Schools” configurations study purely from a financial lens to determine if this direction may allow us to identify significant savings vs. the “Neighborhood Schools” configuration. The School Committee tasked the Superintendent to:
Re-look at the grade level school configuration from a financial perspective to determine if significant savings would be possible to the district if we moved in this direction.
Then based on that determination:
EITHER…
- Move to transition to a different grade level configuration for Fall of 2024 (if significant cost savings were possible)...
OR
- As originally planned to address future growth in the district, move to adjust PK-5 attendance zones for Fall of 2024 implementation.
At this time, we are beginning the process of studying possible configuration options within the district at a high level to determine potential cost/benefit analysis of these options. These will be presented to the Gorham School Committee during their October workshop meeting near the end of the month. The School Committee will then be asked to determine what direction they would like to take from there at their November meeting. While we are looking at several configuration options, the choice the school committee will need to make in November will be to EITHER...(1) pursue one of these configuration changes or (2) not consider configuration changes and instead look to re-zone our 3 neighborhood elementary schools to maximize future growth potential.
As this work goes forward, I will include information in my blog posts to keep parents, students, staff and community updated. Please know if you are hearing "rumors" around the community about what is definitely happening - NO DECISIONS HAVE BEEN MADE. I'd strongly encourage folks with questions to reach out to me directly so that we don't allow the rumor mill to swirl too much! My email is heather.perry@gorhamschools.org.
GMS 20th BIRTHDAY BASH COMING SOON!
Check out the flyer below if you want to come out and help us celebrate GMS's 20th birthday! There will be live music, a brief commemorative ceremony and then lots of games and family fun!
Due to the fact that we anticipate a large number of voters to turn out, and due to the fact that we cannot safely hold elections at Great Falls School while students are on campus, we may have to move schools to remote learning on this day. We will be discussing this more as a district leadership team and with the School Committee before a final decision is made but I wanted to give families as much warning as possible to help plan.
On a related calendar note - just wanted to make sure families know that there will be NO SCHOOL on Oct. 20 due to fall parent/teacher conferences. Schools should be sending out information shortly (if not already) to have parents sign up for conference times.
Finally, just a reminder you can view our school calendar on our website at www.gorhamschools.org
BUS DRIVER APPRECIATION WEEK COMING UP!
Please help us celebrate our AWESOME bus drivers during the week of Oct. 16! They love cards, or other little "thank you's"...or you can put signs out on your lawns, or perhaps say something nice on a social media post! We have INCREDIBLE BUS DRIVERS IN GORHAM! They are often the first "smiles" your children see each day and the last "laughs" they hear each afternoon! Let's make sure to give them all some Gorham Love!
That's it for this post! Catch you next time on October 6!
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