Area's least affluent school leads the pack in test scores

One by one, Sandra Mitchell unfurled the fingers of the gap-toothed boy nestled at her side.

“Five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30,” she counted, smiling as she showed him how to use addition to solve a multiplication problem.

For every skill her students must master, Mitchell has reason to believe in the children of William Marvin Bass Elementary.

Last spring, 95 percent of students passed the state’s standardized math tests and 92 percent passed in reading.

An analysis of 2011 Standards of Learning test results by The News & Advance shows Bass has the highest combined reading and math pass rates of any elementary school in the Lynchburg area, including Lynchburg and Amherst, Appomattox, Bedford, Campbell and Nelson counties.

It’s not affluence driving Bass students’ reading and math success. At Bass, 87 percent of students come from low-income families, a higher percentage than any other public school in the region.

Instead, Principal Leverne Marshall and his teachers paint a picture of a school that evolved a path to success over the course of a dozen years.

School leaders sought to maximize benefits from available federal funds. Big changes, like the 2004 switch to an extended-year calendar, worked together with calculated tweaks — like the decision that Mitchell, a reading specialist, work part time with students who need help in math.

“We want our kids to be able to hope,” Marshall told Lynchburg school board members during a recent presentation on his school’s successes.

“Could we single out one thing that we do better than others? No, because all pieces are working as one.”

***

In the field behind the school on a fall afternoon, Marshall huffs and puffs around an overgrown baseline, sweat dripping from his brow. Gym shorts replace his suit-tie combo.

His twice-a-week running buddies are a gaggle of elementary-school girls who sprint one moment and walk the next. In contrast, Marshall is a steady, persistent presence, calling out encouragement and receiving some of his own.

“Good job, Mr. Marshall!” proclaims teacher Tracie Tkacik, standing ready to decorate him with a pink bracelet to mark his lap around the field.

Tkacik, a wiry fourth-grade teacher, joined Bass Elementary in 1994, one of Marshall’s first hires upon his transfer to Bass from Dearington Elementary.

In their early years together, Marshall and his staff faced the onslaught of a new era in education, the standardized state tests which began in 1998. Like many schools, Bass fared poorly in the first few years of testing. As the division adjusted to the new testing requirements, more schools were able to pass the accreditation threshold, but scores at Bass continued to pose a problem.

“It was frustrating,” Tkacik said, “because it was almost like you knew the kids could do well.”

Marshall and school division leaders felt something had to change.

Extended Year

More than a month before students invade other Lynchburg schools, boys and girls in blue polo shirts stream out of their school buses and into the white, pink and green hallways of Bass’ three-story brick building on Campbell Avenue.

With Lynchburg City School Board approval, Bass implemented the extended-year calendar in 2004 as the lynchpin of a package of reforms that also included school uniforms.

Like other schools in the division, Bass’ regular school year is 180 days. Unlike other schools, though, the school year begins in July. Though students have a shorter summer, Bass has additional vacations and breaks, spaced throughout year.

During the breaks between sessions in August, October, February and April, Bass hosts five “intersession” weeks open to students who need extra help.

The concept is similar to summer school. About 12 students per grade attend, based on academic needs. They get math, reading and writing help in the morning and fun educational activities in the afternoon.

The switch to the extended-year schedule followed years of study. Six teachers chose to leave, according to a newspaper report at the time. Tkacik considered switching to a Bedford County school to be near her own children and on their schedule, but chose to remain at Bass.

She stayed, she said, because she didn’t want to leave the students, the teachers — or Marshall. “That scared me," she recalled. "I just couldn’t imagine working for anybody else.”

Now, Tkacik is a fan of the extended-year schedule, despite school in July.

The treat for teachers, she said, is that intercession allows for quick review of a topic. Students who are floundering often return to regular classes up to speed.

“It’s a miracle,” she explained. “It’s like, ‘Oh my gosh, we just covered this, and you got it!’”

21st Century Community Learning Center

At Bass, intercession weeks aren’t the only opportunities for students who are behind to get ahead or participate in enrichment activities.

The school also has a variety of after-school programming for students, families and parents, funded by a 21 st Century Community Learning Center grant.

Bass received the grant for $540,000 for the first time in 2006 and it was renewed again in 2009.

The federal money, funneled through the state of Virginia, is designed to help boost test scores in core academic subjects through additional time for students — the funds can only be used outside the regular school day.

All three Lynchburg middle schools and Heritage, R.S. Payne, Perrymont, T.C. Miller and Linkhorne elementary schools now have the centers.

At Bass the grant reaches nearly two-thirds of students at the school. More than 180 students participate at some point in the school year, out of 258 total students.

Bass Academy, held every Monday through Thursday after school, includes a weekly mix of homework help, math and reading remediation, time in the library and computer labs, and activities like dance, tennis, song-writing and trips to children’s museums. The grant also pays for the afternoon activities and field trips during intercession weeks.

Other programs funded by the 21 st Century grant include the afterschool “Girls on the Run” jogging club, a GED class for parents and a program called Families and Schools Together, which brings families to Bass practice family communication, share meals and get to know each other.

At last Tuesday’s program, Rose Johnson clapped in time with her granddaughter Keziah, while her grandson Bryan shook a tambourine.

“This little light of mine — I’m gonna let it shine” the three chorused, along with seven or so other families.

Bass’ extended-year schedule, the special activities, and teachers’ efforts to talk with parents, all help make the school unique, Johnson said.

Parent Diane Langhorne said the school’s enrichment activities help promote self-reliance. She is enthusiastic about the progress her son, a first-grader, has made at the school.

“I see it in all areas: academic, behaviors and being independent,” she said. “He’ll let you know he can do it. He’s not having to struggle.”

Title I

With her reading students gathered round, Mitchell opens an oversize storybook to an illustration of the night sky.

“Star light, star bright,” she reads aloud, her silver nail polish sparkling as she points to each word.

Mitchell is part of what’s essentially a third catch net at Bass for students struggling to keep up.

Besides afterschool and intercession remediation, there’s also during-school remediation, provided though the school’s federally funded Title I program.

Lynchburg City Schools channels its Title I resources to all of the elementary schools except Bedford Hills, which has the lowest proportion of students from low-income families. Bass gets the greatest proportion of funds per child, because it has the greatest proportion of students from low- income families.

Mitchell has been teaching at Bass for more than two decades. As a Title I reading specialist, she taught only reading for the majority of her career. Then, around six years ago, Marshall reevaluated the school’s Title I program and asked Mitchell to start teaching math remediation for part of her day.

Both she and Marshall believe this has helped bring up the school’s math scores. Moreover, Mitchell is enjoying the chance to delve into a different subject, after so long teaching in just one area.

About four years ago, Marshall also tweaked the school’s second Title I teaching position. Now, instead of just tutoring students individually, that teacher also pulls larger groups of third- and fourth-grade students for reading remediation classes.

Together, their efforts help free classroom teachers to challenge their other students in reading and math.

Even though she has taught for so long, Mitchell said there are a few important lessons she’s only fully grasped in the last few years.

She told the story of a student who struggled in math and seemed apathetic. One day she noticed he’d had a good result on some quiz or assignment. On a whim, she told him she believed he would pass the SOLs, and promised him an outing if he did. The impossible happened.

“He picked himself up and started rolling from there,” she said. “It’s amazing that the right words from the right person can do something like that. You can turn a kid around, you really can.”

Putting it all together

In Tkacik’s room, while other students have left for math remediation or other activities, advanced students huddle in a cluster of desks, staring down at a blue and orange “24” card.

The game is to add, subtract, multiply or divide the four numbers on the card so they add up to 24.

For the past couple years, Bass has topped the division at the elementary school “24” tournament.

That achievement’s been paralleled by another one.

In the fourth grade, taught by Tkacik and her partner teacher, Veroncia Wayne, 100 percent of fourth graders passed this year in both reading and math — literally no child left behind.

For Tkacik, the success at Bass these days seems more like multiplication than addition, the whole greater than the sum of the parts.

“I feel like the students work hard and the teachers work hard,” she said, “It’s just something about all of it meshing together.”