Talking Points: SAGE Transition to Achievement Gap Reduction Means Problems for Kids

Talking points: SAGE transition to Achievement Gap Reduction means problems for kids

As always, speak from your heart and tell of your own experiences in the classrooms. In addition, here are some points and research to back your experiences up:

• This plan and its rationale are not student centered. It would take away valuable in-class support professionals that provide one-on-one attention.
• The district could eliminate well over 120 front line teaching positions – the exact number is still not provided.
• The district has created62 new positions, which could be teachers or administrators. Who makes that decision is not clear.
• MPS administration made their decision based on multiple conversations with administrators and principals. Front line early childhood educators and families were not in the conversations.
• Families desire communities with well-resourced public schools with small class sizes. Look at MPS student to teacher ratios compared to other districts:
• Current class size ratio in other districts:
• Mequon is 17:1
• Glendale 16:1
• Waukesha 17:1
• South Milwaukee 17:1
• The benefits of reduced class size in early grades are seen across the student’s k-12 school career.
• This is a dramatic shift for well over 15,000 kids and their families with no public input.

Research shows that the benefits from class-size reduction are greater for low-income and minority children. Increasing class sizes will only harm our most vulnerable student population.

Center for Public Education (an initiative of the National School Boards Association)

• Students in grades 1-3 in SAGE classrooms scored significantly higher on the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills in reading, language arts, mathematics, and in total scores, than students in traditional classrooms.
• Although first grade SAGE students had lower pretest scores than students in larger classrooms, the SAGE students had significantly higher post-test scores, indicating that SAGE students made greater gains than those in larger classes—and subsequent analyses showed they maintained these gains through second and third grades.
• Gains for African American students were even greater than those for white students.
• Molnar et al (1999), in their evaluation of Wisconsin’s SAGE, also assessed the achievement gains of African American students. Results for grades 2-3 showed that African American students in SAGE classrooms performed higher on all subtests of the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills (CTBS) (i.e., reading, language arts, and mathematics) than African American students in comparison schools. African American SAGE students in grades 1-3 also achieved greater gains than white SAGE students on the total score from the pre-test to post-test, closing the achievement gap.

Northwestern University Associate Professor Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach and published by the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado Boulder (2014)

• The evidence suggests that increasing class size will harm not only children’s test scores in the short run, but also their long-run human capital formation. Money saved today by increasing class sizes will result in more substantial social and educational costs in the future.
• The payoff from class-size reduction is greater for low-income and minority children, while any increases in class size will likely be most harmful to these populations.
• Policymakers should carefully weigh the efficacy of class-size policy against other potential uses of funds. While lower class size has a demonstrable cost, it may prove the more cost-effective policy overall.