Position:

Middle School Reform: Position and Recommendations

SREE supports the stated intent of, and the majority of the tactics for Middle School Reform in Stamford as positive and necessary, including:

  • Commitment to high standards for all, and closing the achievement gap while raising the bar for everyone
  • Consistent curriculum across the district
  • Improved science curriculum
  • Commitment to staff development
  • Flexibility in group placement, allowing students to be in one group for one subject and another group for another subject
  • And the movement of students among groups over time to match their level and needs

However, it is essential to provide more than two groups in certain core subjects, primarily math and language arts, for several reasons:

  • It is extremely difficult to truly meet the individual needs of a large group of students who span many grade levels in ability in a single classroom in rigorous subjects like math and language arts. Perhaps a small group of master differentiators can do so, and even they could likely make even more progress with a group that was ready to learn at the same level. But we are no where near having a staff full of master differentiators (which takes years and years) and our spread of incoming levels in 6th grade is massive relative to "model districts."
  • The conditions that allow two-group strategies to work in other districts, including "model districts" that the administration benchmarked like Rockville Centre, are not in place in Stamford (such as small support groups of 6 to 8 students, and processes that started in 1st grade to allow for a tighter range among students entering the two-group system).
  • Academic support and academic enrichment are not yet well developed. AE doesn't even exist for 7th grade (despite what the handbook distributed by the administration says).
  • Our highest performing models within Stamford use flexible ability grouping in math and language arts, with great success (see CMT result analysis below)
  • Research used to promote the changes was misleading (at best) and the first year of Stamford's own results with MSR (see CMT result analysis) contradict claims of the panacea heterogeneous grouping.

Continuing down the current path without modification may be highly damaging to the "guinea pig" classes:

  • There is an expected performance dip for the first classes going through a dramatically new approach, as the teachers get used to the curriculum and teaching methods and administrators work out the kinks.
  • This dip is clear in the CMT result analysis.
  • Why inflict a "triple dip" on the Classes of 2016 and 2017? There’s no reason for it since you can get to the same end point of two groups over time with a phased-in approach - doing everything else in MSR, while putting in place the conditions for two groups to at least potentially succeed.

Although the majority of the reform strategy is positive, this tactical point is significant enough to undermine the broader strategy and render the reform ineffective overall, as the results show.

Specific recommendations:

  • Do not use two groups in math and language arts until the conditions are in place for two groups to succeed- including small academic support classes; greater parity of performance entering 6th grade; academic support and academic enrichment curriculum in place; etc.
  • Use flexible grouping in math and language arts, at least, until that is in place.
    • We are not recommending a major overhaul of MSR or of the grouping strategy.
    • We recommend that 1/3 of the day (2 periods of 6) remains fully heterogeneous as it is, and that another 1/3 of the day (science and social studies) remains largely heterogeneous in two groups, as it is.
    • The immediate (and potentially temporary) change we recommend is in two of six periods, that there should be four rather than two groups in math and language arts.
  • This is not logistically complex:
    • For math and language arts, split honors into two parts, with the small upper tail of the bell curve who are able to move more quickly and deeply in these subjects, in an accelerated group. For instance, the top ~10-15% (one classroom full) of students in math may be ready for algebra 1 in seventh grade, so why hold them back?
    • Also for math and language arts, split CP into two parts, with the ~25% or so of students who are struggling the most placed in a class with additional resources, following the model, for instance, of Howard County, which places two teachers in the room for these classes, or alternatively using the Westover School model of providing smaller class sizes for these struggling students.
  • Continue in the two-group structure for science and social studies. Note, however, that the grouping for these subjects should not be based on math and reading scores, but instead, for instance, on teacher input. While math skills may correlate with future performance in AP Physics, there is very little math in the middle school science curriculum.
  • Movement up and down, in subjects with more groups, can now truly be flexible as advertised, with children moved over time to the class that suits them. While standardized tests may be part of the initial placement process, students' actual classroom performance and capability to perform as judged by teachers should play a much larger role in ongoing placement decisions.

To address some myths about SREE's position, these recommendations:

  • Fully value the diversity of Stamford's student body. For those who argue that part of the beauty of Stamford is it's diversity and part of the benefit of going to school in Stamford is getting to interact and share classes with different children from different backgrounds, WE AGREE. We hope this will be all day long as children from all backgrounds qualify for the various class levels in math and language arts, but either way, it will be the case two-thirds of the day under our recommendations.
  • Do not undermine MSR, they enhance MSR and help MSR succeed.
  • Address the fact that CP has a massive range of students - from high 4s to low 1s, perhaps a 5 grade-level spread in ability. It is extremely difficult to meaningfully teach math and LA to children at either end of that range simultaneously, in a large classroom.
  • Address the fact that even honors has too large a range, including students who are ready to take on the next grade-level curriculum. Why hold them back?
  • Would give additional resources to those struggling the most
  • Are not turning back - they are moving forward in a prudent way that minimizes "collateral damage" and "dips" for students who are in the initial classes going through MSR, while we head to the goal.
  • Only change the grouping strategy in 2 of 6 periods per day.
  • Can be implemented overnight - it is not a major overhaul. This is class reshuffling consistent with what should be happening under the regrouping strategy.