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District looks at students at risk
By BARBARA BEHRENDT, Times Staff Writer INVERNESS -- Two-thirds of Citrus County's high school students are at risk for failing the reading portion of the important Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test in their first try. They must pass the test to earn a diploma. School officials say that's an "alarmingly high" number which, if not improved, could mean more students falling behind and more high school dropouts frustrated by their inability to read. Already, the statistics show that 600 more students in the ninth grade from the class of 2004 were tested than in the 10th grade class of 2003. That, officials say, shows that large numbers of students are not meeting the criteria for promotion to sophomore status or have dropped out of school entirely. "We are not where we want to be," said Jan Morphew, the district's director of research and accountability. "But compared to the state, we're not doing too badly." Morphew said the district has made better reading skills a high priority for secondary students. And one way they hope to attack the problem is through a grant the district is seeking from the state. If approved in late January, the grant would provide $75,000 to fund training and materials to help Citrus County's three high schools pull up the sagging reading statistics. "It would be a wonderful thing" to receive the grant, Morphew said. "We really need it." The School Board will be asked to approve the district's submission of the grant application in January. That application is packed with statistical conclusions about the problem and why the money is needed. The application explains in detail how "at risk" students were identified. Schools looked at areas such as eighth-grade test scores, results on specific reading skills exams, and identifying students with low grade point averages and those who failed algebra. "The need is further demonstrated by the large number of students on Academic Improvement Plans," the grant application states. A total of 1,211 students are on such plans, which outline special academic needs and strategies for struggling students. That is enough students to populate an entire high school. Morphew cautioned that the numbers show not only those at risk for not passing the FCAT but also all the students who would take the test, including the exceptional students. That includes those with a variety of disabilities, including learning disabilities. "Our philosophy is to test every student who has the chance at a regular high school diploma," Morphew explained. "But we have just about the largest L.D. (learning disabled) population in the state percentage-wise." School administrators have spent months examining what the district needs to do to bring up scores. In June, 10 secondary teachers and five administrators traveled to Tallahassee to attend the Florida Literacy Project summer workshop and talk more about the problem and possible solutions. The group included not only language arts teachers -- those who would traditionally be the ones focusing on reading training -- but represented every discipline from science to physical education, Morphew said. The secret, she said, is "you train everybody who comes in contact with these students to teach reading." Each of the high schools has developed its own plan on how to improve reading scores, but all have a mixture of elements, including staff training, emphasis on reading in all subject areas, remediation and new reading instruction programs. The state can choose to fund just part of the grant, but Morphew said the hope is that all three schools get $25,000 each. Because each is approaching the issue from a different angle, watching the outcomes from each of the different methods will help officials decide what might be most effective. In addition to the grant project, the district continues to discuss how to improve reading at all levels so that, down the road, students will arrive in high school with all the reading skills they need to succeed. For some time, Morphew and other officials have spoken about how the kinds of reading skills students need have been changed. While reading used to be taught primarily through reading literature, the skills now needed for the test include more informational reading. "Most people think of reading as learning to call words and not being able to synthesize and evaluate what you've learned," Morphew said. "Before basic comprehension was enough, but that's not the way the world is anymore," she said. "Now they have to take what they've learned and apply it to new situations." Morphew said the hope is that the schools will focus on improving reading in the way they targeted writing several years ago. The writing scores soared after that, as writing training became a part of every class. She said that some of the same lessons apply here. "These things can't be separated apart from the rest of your school day," she said.
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