Barrington moms challenge schools over Primrose performance gap (Video)

Parents cite test scores below their peers, and teacher surveys saying classrooms are crowded

By Scott Pickering
Posted 10/21/17

A small group of moms continued their quest for more answers, attention and resources at Primrose Hill Elementary School during Thursday night’s Barrington School Committee meeting.

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Barrington moms challenge schools over Primrose performance gap (Video)

Parents cite test scores below their peers, and teacher surveys saying classrooms are crowded

Posted

A small group of moms continued their quest for more answers, attention and resources at Primrose Hill Elementary School during Thursday night’s Barrington School Committee meeting.

After sitting through a presentation and follow-up question-and-answer period for more than an hour and a half, during which Barrington Assistant Superintendent of Instruction and Curriculum Paula Dillon presented a complex, deep dive into Barrington’s outstanding student test scores, highlighted by five of the town’s six schools performing at the highest levels in Rhode Island, the mothers had their turn.

Invited to ask questions or offer comments by committee chairwoman Kate Brody, they walked to the microphone one by one and asked what is being done about Primrose.

Kristen Pearse, who currently has three daughters at Primrose, referred to all the programs, curriculum strategies and specialists that Ms. Dillon had just delineated and said it sounds great, but “what you’re doing isn’t working” at Primrose.

The Rhode Island Department of Education measures school performance based on how many of a school’s students meet or exceed expectations on standardized tests, namely the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) exams, taken by all Rhode Island schools in the spring of 2017.

In Barrington, Primrose Hill students are meeting or exceeding those expectations 10 to 25 percent less frequently than their peers in the other two K-3 elementary schools, and they have been for most of the past three years (see charts above).

In English Language Arts, the town’s other elementary schools have improved each year. Primrose has declined each year.

In Math, all three of the town’s K-3 schools declined from 2016 to 2017, but Primrose Hill declined the most, and it remains 15 percent behind Sowams Elementary School and 26 percent behind Nayatt Elementary School.

Meghan Siket, mother of two Primrose students, challenged the school department to listen to its own employees — the teachers at Primrose Hill. After complimenting the school department for its high achievements in most areas, she urged that school leaders put more focus on Primrose.

Watch Meghan Siket's entire statement to the Barrington School Committee.

“Barely half of the students at Primrose meet proficiency levels for reading and math, at 54 percent and 52 percent, which I’m not proud of, and I don’t think anyone should be proud of, and it’s a huge disparity between the others schools,” she said.

She went on to talk about class sizes, which is an issue she and other Primrose parents have been questioning for months. On average, Primrose class sizes are 1 to 3 students larger than at the other elementary schools, and they have been for several years.

Ms. Siket ended by citing anonymous survey results with Primrose teachers from earlier this year. Available on the Rhode Island Department of Education website, the survey shows Primrose teachers feel they need more resources and bigger classrooms, much more than their peers in other Barrington elementary schools.

“The results are striking in Primrose,” Ms. Siket said. “The statistic I find most striking is that, while 65 percent feel their classrooms are too crowded, a full 25 percent feel that learning spaces are EXTREMELY crowded, which is discouraging. By comparison, only 5 percent of Nayatt teachers and 0 percent of Sowams teachers feel their classrooms are extremely crowded.”

She added, “I think your teachers are telling you that they feel they are underserved … and I’m just asking that you listen to your teachers when they are telling you these things.”

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