Three Kansas schools recently received 2022 National Blue Ribbon Schools awards for having high scores on state and national tests. I sat down with leaders at the three schools to find out how they were getting those results and what are the biggest challenges they face.
Today, we look at Cottonwood Elementary School, Andover USD 385:
My visit to Cottonwood Elementary required dodging construction cones on bustling Andover Road, main street of the growing suburb on the east side of Wichita.
It was a crisp Friday morning when I arrived in time for the weekly all school assembly. It was sort of a pep rally to honor students for achievement and behavior, work on common goals – the word for the week was patience – and on that day, unfurl the banner school leaders had just brought back from the Washington, D.C. conference where the national Blue Ribbon schools were honored.
Then I sat down with long-time principal Shari Rooks and her retired therapy dog, Brinkley (one of several canines contributing to the spirit of the school) and asked what she thought made the school successful enough to be nationally recognized.
“It's about relationships. Providing a climate that is inviting and academically driven, but still fun,” she said. “As a staff, we talk a lot about how our job at the elementary level is to teach reading and math and kindness. We want our kids to enjoy reading and feel competent in math. We want them to be kind and respectful of one another. For the parents, it's having them trust us to send their kids to us every day.”
To do that, Cottonwood educators say, requires using data. She specifically credited the Kansas State Department of Education’s MTSS (Multi-Tier System of Support and Alignment) program as “the big thing” that has helped improve results. KSDE describes MTSS as a “continuum of evidence based, systemâwide practices to support a rapid response to academic, behavioral, and social emotional learning needs.”
Kambra Gallager, a math and reading specialist, agrees. “I would say one of our biggest strengths (that helped earn the Blue Ribbon designation) is that we were trained in MTSS a long time ago, and we use it the way it's intended. We really do keep track of all of our students and meet with them frequently and do all of the progress monitoring.”
The challenge is not only to identify when students need extra or special help through an intervention but have a system to actually provide help. Cottonwood leaders say they have accomplished this in several ways, starting with a flexible schedule that allows students to get time to work on problem areas without missing out on other things.
For example, Principal Rooks explains, each day students have 90 minutes of English Language Arts. “During those 90 minutes, there is some whole group instruction. But there's also some “center” time where kids are working independently on different things that the teacher wants them to work on. So that's where we find time to work with small groups on the reading and math skills they are struggling with.”
That time allows specialists like Gallager and her colleague, Mary Olin, to work with students on deficiencies.
The process also requires everyone in the school to collaborate, which can be a challenge in any organization. Teachers and other staff must work together to address students' needs, not just focus on “their” classroom. “I was formerly a special education teacher,” said Olin. “And I've heard from many other people that they're not always included in those conversations. So, we really stress that we are a team, and we want them there in meetings about what needs every student has. The more knowledge we have, the better we can serve our students.”
A third component is having enough staff to provide more services. Principal Rooks notes that as a “Title school” based on its low-income population, the school can use federal Title 1 aid for schoolwide programs for all students. Combined with state “at risk” funding and regular education funding that has increased after the Gannon school finance lawsuit and funding plan, the district has been able to hire more staff to work with all students and keep its core of educators.
I asked about the current controversy over social and emotional learning, which some argue is detracting from academics and others fear is intruding into family values. “We've always called these things 21st century learning skills, and nobody had a problem with them,” said Principal Rooks. “We're still teaching patience, respect, and responsibility that has been in our mission statement since day one. But when you throw mental health and those words in there, that gets us in trouble.”
Part of the push to address social and emotional skills, however it is defined, seems to come from a concern that students are bringing greater challenges to school that interfere with learning, and those challenges are not academic, but social and behavioral. I asked about her experience with students over several decades.
“We've always had tough kids?” she said. “They're kids that will cuss at you, flip you off as a first grader, refuse to do school work, run around the classroom and generally have no idea of how to do school. “
Those issues are central to education in Kansas and across the nation. “When we went to Washington, D.C., for the Blue Ribbon award, we heard the same thing,” said Principal Rooks.
What is driving these challenges? Principal Rooks isn’t sure but cites many possibilities. Children who have never been out of the house before starting school because of COVID. Parents whose parenting style is very different than it used to be, with fewer boundaries and exposing children to adult issues before they are five years old, at home or through on-line experiences. “I think we're pushing our kids as a society to become an adult much faster than their brain is capable of, and developmentally the brain is going to stay the same no matter what the year,” she said.
“That is why Andover Public Schools has added a social emotion coordinator; to help teachers work with kids who may experience trauma, anxiety or have behavioral challenges. We want to give our students tools to become successful. It can’t just be about academics,” she said.
“We offer our kids a safe place,” said Mary Olin. “There are so many things that our kids deal with that we as adults didn't have to deal with. Society has changed so much that we just have to continue to evolve and as society changes, we have to change a little bit. When these kids are here, they're here, and we want them to feel safe and we want them to come in and we give them all we can to be able to be ready to learn.”
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