Ponoka Elementary School (PES) and Ponoka Secondary Campus (PSC) have both experienced major transitions this year, as PES changed its configuration to include Grade 6 students and PSC absorbed grades 7 and 8 as well as continuing to undergo extensive renovations.
At the Wolf Creek Public Schools board’s March 5 meeting, representatives from both schools gave presentations regarding how the schools are handling the changes, as well as their plans to further support the success of staff and students.
Ponoka Elementary School
Principal Lois Spate explained to trustees that PES is at a crossroads, stemming from requirements of the provincial and municipal governments; the school has changed grade configurations as it is gearing up to move to a new building in the next school year.
Dynamics of the school now include a Play Academy for young children to attend to get them ready for Kindergarten, as well as a 20 per cent First Nations population.
A large portion of Spate’s presentation focused on the school’s Provincial Achievement Test (PAT) scores and what’s causing the issues the school is facing. “They’re (scores) not pretty. Our PAT results tend to fluctuate up and down from year to year, they’re very inconsistent.”
Spate says the Grade 3 students struggle with achieving a standard of excellence, especially in writing, and the school sits below provincial levels. The students are better with their reading but are still below the provincial level.
With math, there was an increase of students rising from the acceptable level to the standard of excellence. Result graphs show fewer students achieving 80 per cent and a significant increase of those in the 90 per cent range. “That’s where they went. They went up and that’s a really positive thing,” said Gerry Vary, assistant superintendant of Learning Support and System Improvement.
Vary says the Grade 6 students also struggle with reading and writing but score above the provincial level in standard of excellence for science.
From these results, Spate says it’s clear students need target interventions and support as well as re-focusing in literacy and numeracy.
“We need to make sure our most skilled staff need to be working with our most at risk students,” she said. Historically, those students were taught by educational assistants.
Strategies Spate mentioned to help improve the students’ learning capabilities and, subsequently, their PAT results include literacy support for grades 3 and 6 as well as increased teacher collaboration teaching methods.
Next year, an added stress will fall upon both students and staff as the school changes locations. With this physical move, Spate says there must also be a mental shift because she feels, with the move, comes a new beginning for the school where it can redesign its learning environment. “We’re moving to a new land over there (the Diamond Willow Middle School building), but it’s an untamed land.”
Spate’s vision is a “collaborative learning community.” To work toward this framework, the school is in the midst of adopting the principles of “The Leader in Me”, which is an adaptation of ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People”, reworked for a school environment.
Vice principal Nicole Rawlinson added she felt this strategy would anchor the staff and students through the move.
Ponoka Secondary Campus
Looking past the grade re-configurations and renovations, Ponoka Secondary Campus is a school vastly different from peoples’ traditional vision and expectations of a school in physical layout as well as teaching strategies and curriculum design, all of which are tied together.
The school’s layout is based around an open concept, with many non-traditional classroom and learning areas, a flexible schedule and project-based learning methods.
Part of the flexible schedule ideology is a program called Best MESST. Students meet with a hand-picked staff member at the beginning of each week to talk about recent academic performances, which tests they didn’t do well on, classes they’re struggling in, as well as out-of-school factors that affect academic performance. From there, it’s determined where a student will go to learn for certain times during the week depending on what areas need the most support.
Much of principal Ian Rawlinson’s presentation was focused on concerning issues and trends that are prominent in the school.
He mentioned student mental health, drug and alcohol abuse, racism, the multiple deaths and murders relating to members of the school’s community, broken homes, Bosco Home students, and the 225 students that have been identified as at risk to not graduate.
“At the end of the day, all of these things put a massive strain on our staff,” said Rawlinson.
For the students involved, Bosco Homes serve a similar function to a group foster care home. Vice principal Kathy McTaggart says the Bosco Home students rotate through the school at whirlwind speeds, each one only remaining in PSC halls for approximately six months.
“I would say most of them have come from treatment centres,” she added.
The school also serves a number of K and E students, those who will never technically graduate because they lack the capabilities to handle a school curriculum but can achieve a completion certificate from the school.
Many students attending PSC are the breadwinners of their families and, through curriculum scheduling, are supported by the school to work during sections of the school day rather than attend class. “Because the alternative is they wouldn’t be in our school at all,” said Rawlinson.
This adds an extra strain on teachers because on a continual basis students will be missing class. “They’re told to make it work, and they do,” said Rawlinson.
Other issues include the approximate 35-40 students — almost 10 per grade — with chronic attendance issues. Rawlinson says, rather than treating apathy with apathy staff focuses on talking with the students and finding out what the school can do to make them want to attend classes.
Staffing and staff support is another challenge. “(Having) the right people in the right seat,” explained Rawlinson.
Teachers need enough professional development days in order to collaborate teaching methods as well as learn how to handle the variety of student issues and teach through those issues to make the students successful in an individual basis.
Rawlinson said 72 per cent of the Grade 7 students, who newly attend the school this year, have literacy skills below grade level; 35 per cent are at a Kindergarten to Grade 3 reading level and 37 per cent are at a Grade 4 to 5 reading level. He mentioned 27 per cent of Grade 8 students also read at a Kindergarten to Grade 3 level.
Also, 100 per cent of the school’s First Nations students, which is 30 per cent of the total population, are reading at least two levels below grade level.
First Nation student competition rates within the school are also above provincial level, yet only one in five of those students attending PSC will graduate. The province runs at a 10 per cent dropout rate for First Nation students and PSC is closer to 1 per cent. “I can’t be more proud of that. If these students stand a hope in hell they need a high school diploma,” said Rawlinson.
Rawlinson is also concerned with the school’s PAT results. “Our level of excellence is dismal.”
He added the students with high reaching capabilities don’t continue to grow. “And we thought our AP courses would do that.”
Combative strategies designed to increase results include focusing cross-curriculum teaching and giving the students more time between classes, more time to take charge of their own educations, rather than herding them from class to class like cattle.
Although giving the students more free time was a concern of many, they feared students would become rowdy, fight smoke more, Rawlinson says there was only one fight to note and bullying in the school is going down.
The school year also began with a literacy and numeracy boot camp to assess all students.
“At the end of the day, we’re winning . . . we’re going to get through this,” said Rawlinson.
The biggest tactics the school is using to contest all these issues are flexibility, curriculum redesign, pyramids of intervention, and inclusive learning and 21st Century learning. “We do have a lot to celebrate at our school,” said Rawlinson.