Students and teachers at Park Elementary School found out that their school was named a National Blue Ribbon School- one of the highest honors a school can achieve from the U.S. Department of Education- on Sept. 18

Park specifically won the award as an “Exemplary Achievement Gap Closing” school, meaning it is one of the best-performing schools when it comes to closing the gaps in terms of learning outcomes between students at the school.

One factor in particular that led to Park receiving national attention, according to Superintendent Lynn Dambruch, was a large jump in standardized testing scores in mathematics over the past year. The percentage of students that demonstrated proficiency in math at Park more than doubled, with particularly high jumps in proficiency among different student groups at the school.

“Among economically disadvantaged [students], they went from 9.1 percent proficient to 34.5 percent proficient,” Dambruch said. “It’s a huge gap closing in one year.”

Principal Daniel Sylvestre said that what he believes set Park apart during the application process were systems in place including co-teaching classrooms, the full-time presence of a social worker, as well as math and reading specialists and helping children on a case-by-case basis if they’re struggling in the classroom.

Director of Elementary Education Patti Cousineau said the impact of those specialists was monumental, and praised their work in Warwick’s elementary schools.

“That has made a huge difference, because they’re boots-on-the-ground and they’re there day in and day out in one school,” Cousineau said. “They know and love their staff and students that they can provide help to.”

The test numbers are particularly noteworthy because of concerns of “learning loss” from the COVID-19 pandemic. Standardized test scores in the United States, as well as statewide, are currently trending down, according to Director of Curriculum, Instruction and Assessment Lisa Schultz.

Schultz, who was the principal at Park from February 2020 through August 2021, said that following the pandemic, the school department wanted to focus on accelerating learning instead of making up for learning loss. They did so by moving classrooms forward with teaching as a whole and having specialists help the children that may have had learning loss.

“We didn’t want teachers to go back and keep re-teaching after COVID- we were afraid that we’d maybe be holding kids back that were ready to jump forward,” Schultz said. “You can’t teach down. You have to teach up, and then kids rise up to meet those high expectations.”

This is the second time that a Warwick public school has won a Blue Ribbon Award since its inception in 1982. The other winner? Also Park, back in 2011.

While Sylvestre and Schultz’s tenures do not extend all the way back through those twelve years, both said that support from the Park community has helped the school maintain a high standard.

“There was huge community support for the school,” Schultz said. “We had a lot of parents that cared about the academics. That caring, positive community really helped.”

The award, Sylvestre said, will help encourage parents to come to the Park community and keep their children in the Warwick public school system.

“Wherever life will lead them, our goal is to help them along the way,” Sylvestre said.

Schultz said that three other elementary schools in the district- Scott, Warwick Neck and Norwood- also made big gains in math and English Language Arts (ELA) proficiency, and could potentially be candidates for Blue Ribbon awards in the future.

Sylvestre and a teacher from the school will be attending a national awards ceremony in Washington, D.C. in mid-November. A celebration at Park will occur on a date that is yet to be determined.

For the staff and students at Park, being named a Blue Ribbon school is a validation of the work that they have put in to improve over the past year.

“I’m so proud of our students,” Sylvestre said. “They’ve worked so hard, and our families have given them a hand in helping out with this process.”