By Del Stover
08/02/05–Years ago, as school officials in East Baton Rouge Parish, La., worked to boost student achievement, they ran into a seemingly intractable obstacle: So many students moved during the year that it was disrupting their education -- as well as that of others in the classroom.
But they eventually came up with a useful response -- at least for students moving within the school district. All schools were put on a common curriculum and instructional schedule.
“If a student transfers to another school, [his or her new class] will be in or around the same chapter of the textbook,” says district spokesperson Tai St. Julien. “So this eases or reduces the time lost to instruction due to a move . . . of missing a few days of classroom instruction.”
It’s an innovative strategy -- but school officials around the nation could use a few more. Student mobility -- the rate at which children switch schools -- is a challenging problem.
How bad is it? Some urban schools report student turnover rates of 40 percent to 80 percent annually, and the Education Resources Information Center Clearinghouse on Urban Education reports that many urban students move six times or more between kindergarten and high school.
Where student mobility is high, the instructional challenges are great. Faced with a revolving door of students, teachers and administrators must spend precious time tracking down records and assessing where new students are in their coursework.
Too often, teachers must focus classroom lessons on bringing newcomers up to speed rather than on new lessons.
The disruption in instruction -- along with the stress of a new move -- has a strong, negative impact on students, research shows. A student who moves three or more times can score nearly 20 points lower on achievement tests.
The impact is all the more important to schools in the wake of the No Child Left Behind Act, which puts enormous pressure on schools to raise student achievement across the board.
Although school officials have no control over the causes of student mobility -- poverty, the availability of affordable housing, domestic violence, migrant work, and large concentrations of rental property -- some districts are trying to ease the impact on children.
In Denver, for example, school leaders have put in place a system to track students who move within the school district -- and quickly put these students’ records in the hands of teachers and principals, says district spokesperson Tanya Caughey.
The academic level of new students is assessed within 15 days of starting school. “We make sure we’re meeting those students’ needs appropriately,” Caughey says.
In Holyoke, Mass., which has a 35 percent mobility rate, officials launched a new program for middle school students who arrive in the middle of the year. Newcomers are assigned to a special program where teachers help them catch up to their future classmates before they are assigned to a regular classroom.
“We wanted to ease the impact on children coming in and out of a classroom like it’s Grand Central Station,” Superintendent Eduardo Carballo told the Boston Globe.
In Prince George’s County, Md., where a large number of military families and a high concentration of rental property boosts mobility rates, school officials embraced a strategy similar to the one used in East Baton Rouge Parish: A standardized curriculum and list of textbooks eases the disruption for students moving within the county.
In fact, Prince George’s County is using a voluntary state curriculum partly designed to ease student transfers within the state.
The St. Paul, Minn., school district is using a different strategy: Parents who move are encouraged to have their children complete the school year at their old school. Free transportation is provided.
East Baton Rouge Parish also offers transportation to encourage students to finish the school year without changing classes, St. Julien says. When students do transfer, the district relies on staff “parent liaisons” to help parents get immunization records and complete other paperwork as quickly as possible to ease children’s re-entry into the classroom.
In Plano, Texas, school officials are targeting additional resources into elementary schools with high numbers of disadvantaged students and high mobility rates. The Key Schools program stresses teacher preparation, parent involvement, and a rigorous curriculum.
The Tumwater, Wash., school district, which has a 25 percent student mobility rate, focuses on reducing the instructional time lost tracking down records and assessing a student’s academic level. The sooner teachers know where students are, officials say, the sooner they can get them up to speed.