It's summertime, but life is not so easy for students going back to school for help over the FCAT hurdle.
By JEFFREY S. SOLOCHEK
Published June 8, 2003
Summer vacation takes a detour back to school Monday for dozens of Hernando County third-graders who would rather be playing outdoors.
These children will spend 35 hours over the next two weeks trying to prove they can read well enough to move into the fourth grade in the fall. All are threatened with retention because they didn't pass the reading section of the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test.
Superintendent Wendy Tellone said she hopes to have answers for all the children before June ends, so they have enough time to prepare for the new school year that begins Aug. 11.
The 10-day intensive program, to be taught by district teachers in classes of about 15, will focus on the eight reading skills the state has said third-graders must master before promotion, district reading specialist Paul Tune said. The skills are:
Reading for vocabulary.
Reading for meaning, including relevant supporting details.
Identifying the author's purpose.
Recognizing comparison and contrast.
Reading for research.
Understanding plot development and how conflicts are resolved.
Knowing similarities and differences among characters, settings and events.
Recognizing cause-and-effect relationships.
At the end of the course, the children should be better prepared to pass a state-approved alternative to FCAT, called SAT-9, Tune said. They also should have completed enough appropriate work to fill a portfolio that can document their success, he added.
Students who do not score well enough on SAT-9 can ask their principal and the district superintendent to promote them based on the collected works.
"Hopefully, we can get them to the point that, through a portfolio, they can prove to the district they are ready for the fourth grade," Tune said.
But even the portfolio is no guarantee. The state has set strict guidelines for it, too.
According to a January State Board of Education memo, the portfolio must be selected by the student's teacher, include only student work produced in the classroom and prove the student has met the benchmarks for third-grade reading.
The evidence must include multiple-choice items and reading passages that are approximately 60 percent literary text and 40 percent information text, averaging 350 words each. Chapter and unit tests are acceptable, as are teacher-prepared assignments, so long as they are aligned with the Sunshine State Standards.
For each skill, the student must have at least five examples of mastery, in which the student received a C grade or better. Work finished after a student has taken the FCAT is allowed.
Tellone said she will consider each request for promotion by portfolio carefully. But she did not expect to reject recommendations coming from teachers and principals.
By the end of last week, 93 of the 218 children eligible for the summer program had enrolled - 59 at Deltona Elementary in Spring Hill and 34 at Moton Elementary in Brooksville. Tune said the summer program would accept students through the first day.
"The main thing is, they've got to be able to complete the remediation," Tune said.
Among those who did not sign up, some were struggling in third grade, and their parents chose to skip summer programs, Tune said. They will repeat third grade next year.
About 15 percent of the students passed the SAT-9 before the school year ended, he said. The state allows them to progress without a portfolio.
School Board members, who readily canceled summer school a few years ago in favor of more immediate remedial work during the school year, questioned the wisdom of trying to cram all the needed reading work into a two-week "camp." But they did not hesitate to commit about $18,000 to the state-mandated effort and busing, even though the state no longer pays for summer programs.
"You would want to do everything you can to make a child successful," board Chairman John Druzbick said. "That is our goal."
For those who do not pass muster on the SAT-9 or the portfolio, another less attractive option still exists, added Chocachatti Elementary School principal Michael Tellone, the district's lead elementary-level principal.
The state recently announced that once those children have mastered the FCAT reading skills, the school may promote them at any point during the coming year, Tellone said.
- Jeffrey S. Solochek covers education and politics in Hernando County. He can be reached at 754-6115 or solochek@sptimes.com
