As students prepare for the opening of schools – some beginning later this week – superintendents are outlining changes, improvements and goals for the upcoming school year.
Tiverton School Superintendent Robert E. Terrill said he feels like his town is on a roll: an industrial park is moving through the approval process and plans for a golf course and marina are in the works.
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“Tiverton is poised to make some big gains,” he said. “The school system is trying to parallel that positive outlook.”
The proposed developments could mean improvements to Tiverton’s tax base by as much as 30 percent, Terrill said.
A committee has been formed to compose a referendum for facility improvements to the high school and elementary schools.
“Hopefully, we can catch this wave of prosperity in Tiverton and go with it,” he said.
Along with that, Terrill said, will be an effort to improve the instructional quality of his district – which has 2,200 students in its high school, middle school and four elementary schools – and performance on state tests.
Last year, 75 percent of Tiverton’s eighth graders performed at or above the standard in mathematics skills, according to statistics from the Rhode Island Department of Education. Forty percent performed at or above standard in mathematics (problem-solving), 30 percent in reading (analysis and interpretation) and 80 percent in writing (effectiveness).
Rhode Island’s elementary school and middle school students have made significant progress, as a whole, in mathematics over the past decade, according to the most recent test scores from the National Center for Education Statistics.
The scores, which are the results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) test administered last year to a sample of 5,000 students in 100 schools, showed that 23 percent of the 4th graders and 24 percent of the 8th graders who took the test were “at or above the proficient level.”
In 1996, the last time the test was administered, only 17 percent of the 4th graders and 20 percent of the 8th graders were proficient. In 1992, only 13 percent of the 4th graders and 16 percent of the 8th graders were proficient.
According to figures from the Rhode Island Department of Education (from school year 1999-2000), the Ocean State has 156,500 students and 11,000 full-time teachers at its 314 schools in 37 districts.
“We have several important things going on in the district,” said Exeter-West Greenwich School Superintendent Robert A. Hicks.
At the elementary level, Hicks said his district hopes to improve math skills. To this end the district will enter the school year with a revised curriculum and a focus on staff development opportunities for teachers.
Exeter-West Greenwich middle schoolers will be organized into four teams this school year; the district is going to begin “looping” – students will have the same teacher for two years – in middle school as well.
“It makes instruction more efficient,” Hicks said. “A good part of the beginning of the year is establishing routines and relationships.”
Hicks said that includes parent-teacher communication.
And in order to curb his district’s dropout rate (15 percent over four years, with a graduation rate of 85 percent), Hicks said the district will attempt to take a more personalized approach to instruction, offering students more choices.
Increased budget
for public schools
Statistics from the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council (RIPEC) indicate dramatic increases in educational spending in the 1990s. From fiscal year 1990 to fiscal year 1999, state aid for education increased by 82.1 percent, and Rhode Island state and local governments spent close to $1.2 billion on public education during school year 1998-99, according to the agency’s RIPEC Results-Education in Rhode Island 2000.
In 1998-99, Rhode Island spent approximately $7,607 per student, 6th highest in the nation and 21.7 percent above the national average.
The number of students attending RI’s public schools increased by 11.6 during the last decade, from school year 1990-91 to 1998-99.
Earlier this summer, the RIPEC released its annual report “How Rhode Island Schools Compare,” which found that:
Rhode Island’s average teacher salary increased 30.5 percent from 1989-90 to 1999-00 compared to the U.S. average increase of 30.0 percent. The state’s ranking changed little over this period, dropping from seventh ($36,057 in 1989-90) to eighth highest ($47,041 in 1999-00) among the 50 states. Rhode Island’s average teacher salary in 1999-00 was second highest among all New England states;
The Ocean State’s estimated expenditures per student in fall enrollment ($7,990) grew by 22.5 percent during this same 10-year period, compared to an average increase nationwide of 35.5 percent. Rhode Island’s expenditures per student in fall enrollment was 20.6 percent higher than the national average ($6,627).
