GRAY, Maine — A cutting-edge education experiment at Gray-New Gloucester Middle School could become the norm in Maine if Education Commissioner Stephen Bowen has his way.
On any given day, students from as many as three grades can be found studying together in the same classroom. Instead of letter grades, student performance is based on a numbered system in which 4 means proficient and a 1 or 2 means the student has more work to do before moving on. And teachers who were used to pulling entire classes of students through the same lessons at the same speed now are responsible for monitoring each student’s progress individually.
Only a handful of schools in Maine are embracing proficiency-based learning to the degree that Gray-New Gloucester schools do, though Bowen said many more are in the early stages. That’s why Bowen, who is pushing a new education strategy for Maine that includes many of those concepts, visited the school Friday, where students, teachers and administrators told him their experiment is a work in progress and hasn’t advanced without challenges.
Fifth-grader Abbey Chandler told Bowen she doesn’t see her schoolwork as an experiment.
“We’re not guinea pigs,” said Chandler pointedly during a question-and-answer session with Bowen where the students were the ones providing the answers.
“What are you?” said Bowen with a chuckle.
“I’m a kid,” said Chandler. “We’ve all committed our time to trying this. This is school.”
If the model in use in the district isn’t an experiment, then it’s a study, at least for those looking in from the outside, according to Principal Sherry Levesque. She said less than three years into the new strategy, dozens of people from other school districts in Maine and beyond have visited to watch how Gray-New Gloucester Middle School is pulling it off.
“We’re 2½ years into developing this and I don’t think we’re finished,” said Levesque. “We’re probably halfway to where we need to be. But when these kids go home and say to Mom and Dad, ‘This is good for me, I feel good about what’s going on at school,’ that’s a big boost.”
Since becoming the state’s education commissioner last year, Bowen has been consistent in terms of his desire to reform education in Maine — and to do it without costing state or local taxpayers any more than they’re paying now. A key part of his strategy — which he released earlier this year in written form — is the idea that students don’t learn at the same rates and therefore shouldn’t be taught that way. But even he says that going from what most schools have done for decades to the new model is a monumental task.
“It’s not a program in a box that you can just unpack,” he said.
Kristi Fecteau, who teaches math and science to students in levels five and six — levels based on their abilities, not grades based on their ages — said she was apprehensive when administrators and the MSAD 15 board started discussing the proficiency-based model a few years ago. She said overall, it has made her job harder.
“It’s the hardest thing I’ve done, but it’s also the best teaching I’ve done,” Fecteau said on Friday during a free period. “When you’re nervous and uneasy about something, that’s when you learn the best and that’s how it is for my students. I feel like because of this, they’re going to be more prepared. They need to know everything before they move on.”
Various teachers do it differently, but in general most classrooms at Gray-New Gloucester Middle School are adorned with charts on the walls that mark each student’s progress through milestones, whether it’s earth science or long division. Fecteau said in her class, each day starts with meetings between students and teachers — Fecteau team-teaches with someone else — about what the students’ goals are for that day. All of it is carefully tracked with software and individual assessment folders.
Fecteau said a positive effect is that most students seize control of their own progress without being asked to.
“I had students taking math assessments on the last day of school last year because they wanted to get to level six before the school year ended,” she said. “I’ve had students who wanted to work on their lessons during summer vacation. They all have their own goals.”
Lisa Knedler, another teacher at the school, said the magic of the program is mostly on the student side, not the teacher’s.
“Building a culture in which the students are part of the process has been critical for us,” she said. “That’s been very powerful. It used to be like, ‘Oh well, they got a D,’ and we moved them on anyway. Now the students get the help when they need it.”
Some are skeptical, including parents, according to eighth-grader Rachael Lachance.
“My mom doesn’t really care for it right now,” said Lachance. “But I’m trying to convince her that this is a better system.”
Hey look how many people seem to care about what Mr. Bowen is doing to our schools. Ten years from now we’ll all be saying who the heck thought any of this was a good idea to be spread into places like East Dumb Duck Maine? It’ll be mirror time but we’ll again find someone else to blame as we go on to the next big expensive government experiment.
This system isn’t costing more money. Our school budget actually spends less than what the government suggests, which is not all good and not all bad. The goal is to engage kids in learning so that they are ready for whatever their next step is.
It may not be costing more YET (In this single system and on this small scale) but you have to consider other cost as well, like what will be the cost to all children if all of Bowen’s/ Maine Heritage Folks ideas come to pass? Nor will any success that may be seen in Gray-New Gloucester likely be transferable to other areas of Maine where the socioeconomic background of our student population is a world apart from anything like what the children and parents of Gray-New Gloucester simply take for granted. Why do you suppose this experiment didn’t take place in someplace like Milo Maine? Because it (Like all efforts to succeed past and current) would have flopped miserably. Why are schools in general flopping? Because students don’t care and their parents aren’t involved until either the student has failed or are held accountable in anyway while at school. Then parents come in with guns a blazing to point a finger at anyone but themselves. Why will “it” (Most any concerted positive effort) find “some” success in Gray-New Gloucester? Because children and parents from higher socioeconomic backgrounds are better prepared to take advantage of any opportunity presented to them. Believe me the radical right politicians now in power within State government will go out of their way to make this work in a best case scenario to justify the kinds of things they want to do statewide. Voucher, charters, etc. etc. all of which will be harmful to the majority of our state’s public school children. As I said above, this will all become clear to you in about ten years. Good luck.
well, I can’t say the GNG has the same economic profile as any other school in cumberland county, we’re more aligned with Androscoggin County from that standpoint. And, I think it is self-evident that children do better when their parents are engaged and involved, though I’ve seen exceptions to that rule too. So many things have changed in the past 100 years, but the method of delivering instruction in most schools hasn’t. So, overall, I think this is good. In a way it does harken back 100 years – groups of kids working together at their level, regardless of age, to work their we through the curriculum. Peer support can help the kids who don’t get it at home, so I think that is a benefit too. Thanks for the wish of good luck. We’re not a charter or voucher school, this is public school trying to engage kids and community without saying that more money is the answer. Working with what we have to try to engage in learning. The parent piece is tricky- how to you engage the parents if they don’t want to be – we struggle with that all the time.
Saying education hasn’t changed in 100 years is flat out wrong and it frightens me to hear someone who claims they once served as a school board member repeat such silliness. I’ve always thought board members were clueless as to the realities on the ground in the schools they serve. You’re confirming it with comments like that.
If any human from 100 years ago stepped into one of today’s schools they would first be overwhelmed by the complexity and high expectations (At least on paper or proposed by educators) in today’s schools. The next most obvious thing an old time student would learn from watching their modern day peers would be a general amazement over what students are allowed to do or not do during their school day (Yes, you can now treat teachers with little or no respect without worry of suffering any significant consequence for doing so, and no you really don’t have to do anything during your educational day that you don’t want to do).
I never suggest that Gray-New Gloucester was a Charter or Voucher school, only that the steps you’re taking there are right in line with the steps Mr. Bowen and the Maine Heritage folks want to take us in and that direction (Charters-Vouchers-proficiency-based learning strategies will not likely work in improvised areas of Maine (i.e. Most of the State) any more than any other effort that has been made locally or via a multitude of State implemented programs over the past 50-60 years.
We don’t need government to fix our schools, our children, or ourselves. We need to first fix ourselves as “Present” parents (We can’t be “Absentee“ on this responsibility for ever). Repairs to the educational status of our children and our schools will follow as a natural consequence of such self-reflection, realization, and effort. Cost? Nothing.
How do you engage parents? The same way you did 100 years ago. Tell them straight up that their child is failing and or disruptive to the education of others. Face that, fix that, or your child will be (Just like they used to be) sent to an alternative educational institutions or placed into the hands of institutions or other families that are willing to take the responsibility of actually raising a child. What we are currently doing is the exact opposite of that. We placate parental incompetence and waste much of our educator’s time and taxpayer money trying to find ways not to hold either the parent or child responsible for positive educational effort or advancement. It’s insane!
oh dear, I wish it were all that cut and dried. Have a great week!
Quoting the Education Commissioner, the school principal, and a fifth grader probably doesn’t tell the whole story. Citing parental concerns may get the reader closer to the reality. It might have been informative to read what the parents concerns are. Parents tend not to have a pony in the show. Still, this experiment has more merit than charter schools, especially Christian ones.
StillRelaxin may turn out to be right in the end.
Mr. Bowen has yet to articulate what the evidence is that this strategy really works, and less importantly, but more practically, how *exactly* his theories will be implemented at a statewide level. Showing off in a a school that is already doing what he thinks is cool does little to spread the message throughout the state at a classroom level.
As a parent and a school board member during the exploration of this program, I can say that overall it appears to be better than the archaic system in place at many schools. More ownership, more collaboration, more invested learning. The ability to stop, check, and adjust on an individual basis. Because kids aren’t widgets – each one is unique, and therefore a one-size-fits-all solution doesn’t work. The first two years are a lot of work for the staff, but it appears to be good and interesting work with a big payoff.
I’m a parent at the school and this has been great for my kids – they love taking control of their learning. However, one size will never fit all with kids. They are all unique. This system allows to “stop/check/adjust”. The first two years are a lot of work for the staff, and most feedback I’ve heard is positive. The end result being more engagement, more investment, more learning.