School Report Card

Showing good progress

By Tim Forsberg
Posted 12/8/16

It was a year of changes and advancements in the Johnston School District, and Superintendent Dr. Bernard DiLullo, Jr. is optimistic about the future of the town's nearly 3,200 students while recognizing that there are challenges ahead.

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School Report Card

Showing good progress

Posted

It was a year of changes and advancements in the Johnston School District, and Superintendent Dr.  Bernard DiLullo, Jr. is optimistic about the future of the town’s nearly 3,200 students while recognizing that there are challenges ahead.

“The district as a whole is working very hard. In Rhode Island, education has been kind of cyclic in terms of sticking to one focus and staying on one focus. Our teachers, our staff, our administrators have been very flexible in taking on new ideas, establishing new programs, and taking on a whole new set of standards,” said DiLullo. “With those changes, there’s a bit of a learning curve and teachers have to learn new instructional practices, programs and curriculum, and they’ve been willing to do that and I believe they’ve done that well and I believe they serve our students well.”

DiLullo recently provided a wide-ranging, year-end analysis of the town’s educational system, its leadership team, facilities, and newly implemented technologies and programs, along with the impacts these developments effect students learning capabilities.

Two years ago, full day kindergarten was implemented, and according to DiLullo, the student benefits can already be seen.

“Both kindergartens are going well, both at the ECC (Early Childhood Center) and at Barnes. We have two classrooms at Barnes. The full day kindergarten has been such a boost in terms of being able to accomplish what you need to accomplish in kindergarten at this point. Kindergarten is not like we remember it, kindergarten is very academically and content focused at this point, where students have to come out reading, they have to come out knowing vocabulary, they have to come out with numeracy skills,” said DiLullo.

He added the teachers have been very skilled at making sure the students reach their targets and that they did a great job when it was a half-day program. “Now that it’s a full day program, it’s just so much more comfortable for the students; they’re not pushed fast, their transitions are appropriate to their age, because as you know a five year old takes a while to make a change from one thing to another. After last year’s group, we’re seeing those students coming in much more prepared for grade one so teachers are not spending the whole first quarter doing kindergarten skills.”

At the elementary school level, DiLullo noted that while current facilities are serving students adequately, there might be a better solution for the town’s youngest pupils.

“Most of our buildings are old, they'e 1950s and 1960s buildings, some are older than that, but physically they are well kept. So if you walk into any school in the district, you’re going to see the floors are in good shape, the walls are in good shape, there’s no graffiti, the lighting is good we’ve upgraded all the lighting,” he said. “On occasion we have some heating issues, but that’s because some of the boilers are older, but there’s a plan to replace those.”

Other building amenities, which drew the attention of residents at recent Town Council meetings and during this year’s election, have been noted by the administration.

“Years ago, Barnes Elementary, Thornton Elementary, and Windsor Hill Elementary Schools all had modulars attached to them, and that was just for expansion of classroom space. So they’re technically not trailers, they’re actually like a modular home that’s set on a foundation, and those classrooms have plumbing in them, they have self-contained bathrooms right in the classroom. But at this point they’ve kind of lived their life.

DiLullo believes the future solution to the district’s aging infrastructure lies in centralization and combination of resources to effectively educate at the elementary level.

“I think as a district we really need to start looking toward new elementary schools. Our elementary schools are very old and I think it would be great if we start looking towards a centralized elementary school or a couple of elementary schools on a campus that would meet the needs of all of our kids and eliminate a lot of those smaller, older out of date buildings,” he said.  “But at this point they’ve kind of lived their life and I think as a district we really need to start looking toward new elementary schools.” 

The superintendent believes a roadblock to this plan in Johnston is that available land for such a project is limited, and that a good parcel of land is needed to build a school of this caliber. Current elementary schools are situated on smaller lots, which would provide inadequate space.

At Ferri Middle School, Matthew Stephen Tsonos is serving as interim principal for the school year, supported by three interim assistant principals that share responsibilities, according to DiLullo.

“These people are pretty experienced, they’ve had administrative experience. The fact that Mr. Tsonos is relatively new in the leadership role, I thought it would be a good idea to have some experienced people come in to oversee what’s happening, to mentor both he and Mr. [Robert] DiMuccio [assistant principal] in the middle school year,” said DiLullo, who added that Mr. Tsonos position may become permanent. “It’s always optimal to get somebody who knows the system, knows the faculty, knows the students, and certainly if Mr. Tsonos is able to do the job of course he’d be a possible candidate.”

Serious administrative changes at the high level also occurred this past year after principal Zachary Farrell took a position with Cranston’s schools. Former Ferri principal Dennis O. Morrell now serves as the principal, while Michael Mancieri and Donna Pennacchia now serve as assistant principals.

“It’s going well, it’s going well, they seem to be a solid team, they seem to be a team that’s set standards in the school, they’ve set expectations in the school for both students and faculty. I think from all accounts, and I think you’d get that feedback if you spoke to faculty members or if you spoke to parents, that the high school is running well,” said DiLullo.

In terms of meeting state and federal education standards, DiLullo acknowledges that improvements at the elementary level have been made and are continuing.

“When you look at the town, there’s a wide difference between the socioeconomic status of students that go to Thornton as opposed to the socioeconomic status of students go to Brown Avenue. So within that we also see a range of achievement. For example, Brown Avenue is a commended school by the state because their students are doing very, very well in both reading and math,” said the superintendent. “When you look at Thornton, although Thornton has been identified as one of the only Title 1 elementary schools in the state, where the Fourth grade met or exceeded the state average in reading and math. They have work to do, and the whole concept of Title 1 delineation is that we’re able to provide them with extra services, so services that Brown Avenue doesn’t necessarily get because their students are doing well, are provided at Thornton Elementary School.”

DiLullo stated that, at Thornton, the district added a math interventionist, a reading interventionist, and have two reading specialist that assist students there along with a behavior specialist that deals with behavioral problems. But at the middle and high school levels, he recognizes there is room for improvement in educational standards.

“At the middle School and high School, we have work to do there. While we’re close to the state average, we want to exceed the state average and be better than the state average so we continue to provide support and services to those areas as well,” he said. “But it all starts at the elementary level, and once those kids are reading well and they’re skilled in numeracy you’re going to see that happen as we move along.”

Aiding that initiative is the district’s implementation of technological changes designed to help children become proficient with computers and the internet. They’ve established a new position, an Instructional Technology Coordinator, and have a teacher, Deborah Ramm, in that role.

“We’ve done a number of things in the district, we started out with a one to one computer program at the middle school. Apple came in and trained our teachers, both on basic skills and then on content specific uses for the laptops. We then expanded the computer program to the high school, currently the high school is fully one to one in terms of laptop computers,” said DiLullo. “Our ECC students are one to one with laptops. The kindergarten students are actually learning coding skills now. In order to make that all work we established a new position in the district for the elementary schools, because in the elementary schools we are now piloting what we call lighthouse classrooms, and those classrooms are, for all intents and purposes, one to one classrooms, each student has access to laptop computers, teachers are specifically trained in blended learning, and blended learning is kind of a traditional approach to instruction as well as the use of technology to support instruction.”

While the schools’ budget has been level funded for several years, an additional $600,000 was added last year to accommodate all day Kindergarten, which DiLullo said was very helpful. He stated that the district is seeing more student social and emotional needs and is trying to expand guidance services. He commends the School Committee, and recognized them for their commitment to the students and their support of innovative programs.

“One of the key reasons to adding guidance to the elementary schools is that our guidance councilors are now going into classrooms and actually dealing with those issues. Being kind to each other, being respectful to each other, how to interact with each other, and then if a problem comes up they’re the first level of action,” said DiLullo. “I think our biggest challenge is the social media aspect of bullying, we don’t have a lot of control over that and it takes place outside of the school day. So we try to teach kids to be responsible in terms of their use of technology, that’s one of the first concepts they learn when we pass out computers, they learn how to become good digital citizens. With 3200 kids, there are a lot of places to look, and our resource officers hove been very helpful. It’s a challenge but it’s a challenge that I think we’re managing well at this point.” 

With the holidays fast approaching and students looking forward to break, DiLullo is hopeful that next year will see even more student and staff successes.

“We value all of our staff, we value all of our students and their families, we want to do the best for them, and in turn we would encourage them to be lifelong learners,” he said.  

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  • PantherMom

    Sounds visionary. So, is there going to be an improvement plan? Or are we going to keep blaming "socioeconomic status."

    Friday, December 9, 2016 Report this