At the October South Orange-Maplewood Board of Education meeting, district staff presented data that they said showed that the decision to "level up" — or combine Levels 3 and 4 for 7th graders in English Language Arts, Science and Social Studies — has been a success.

Some residents and parents of students in the district disagree. At the Nov. 21 Board of Education meeting, some parents made public comments challenging the district's interpretation of the data, while others simply questioned the decision to level up.

In October, Superintendent of Schools Dr. Brian Osborne, said that the results were "pretty good, not earth shattering," but proved that the decision to level up could benefit Level 3-recommended students without damaging the prospects of high-achieving students in Level 4.

District Chief Information Officer Paul Roth presented detailed data on the performance of 2009-2010 6th and 7th graders as compared to their 2010-2011 cohorts. The reports — complete with extensive charts — are available on the district website.

Local resident Jeffrey Bennett says he has taken a very close look at the data and does not like what he sees. Of the level up outcomes analysis, Bennett said: “I’m sorry to say the level-up outcome analysis was sloppy, misleading and incomplete.” Bennett contended that the 2009-10 and 2010-11 student data were not comparable. He said that the 2009-10 data have students who were actually placed in level 3 or 4 while the 2010-11 data includes students who had merely been recommended for levels 3 or 4.

“Since students were leveled up by parental request, before de-leveling. There were usually some weaker students in a higher level class," said Bennett. "In 2010-11, that didn’t happen since level 3 and level 4 were going to be combined anyways. So there was no need to change level recommendations since students would be in a higher level class anyway.”

Bennett went into a breakdown of the changes in numbers in the leveled classes per subject. He said some students were not categorized since they were transfers, and, since students were not categorized, the classes were smallest in years. Bennett said that this change in the dimension of the cohorts made level up look better, though that may not have been the intention.

“Because weaker students were moved down a level, this should make us challenge the claim that there was no harm done to top achieving students. The scores to level 4 and level 3 would actually be lower if their cohorts were the same as the year before.”

Tom Borello told the Board of Education that some NJASK and final exam grades were missing from the data. He said that depending on the subject area, 47-78 grades were missing. He questioned why that was.

He said he understood that 35 students joined the districts and level 4 classes, but were not included in the analysis.  Also, he said that 12 were moved up.

“This explanation does not completely satisfy my inquiry about the numbers.  While these 47 students could account for all the scores missing from the language arts and science grades, they could not account for all 78 grades missing from social studies.”

Rusty Reeves questioned the data as presented: “The explicit goal of the de-leveling in the sixth and seventh grades was to reduce the achievement gap.  The results to date have shown that effort has been unsuccessful.”

Reeves said that, according to the data presented by the district, it appears that the achievement gap has increased in sixth and seventh grade language arts scores. Reeves said that, according to the scaled scores for grades 3-8, the achievement gap hasn’t changed.

“This board and this superintendent proposed modest changes informed by data. Yet now that the data doesn’t support the district’s changes, we are prepared to double-down on this losing bet."

Andrea Marino quesioned the results looking at grades awarded students. “Although some level 3 students may have benefited, a large amount of students ended up with D’s and F’s as final grades.” Marino also contended that the level 4 grades looked like “massive grade inflation.”  She said that students on both sides of the spectrum are suffering.

"Casting aside these data and steadfastedly pursuing further de-leveling at this point would be like telling those children to ‘take a hit for the team’ as their needs are getting lost in the latest fads of politics and public education,” said Marino.

Meg Adams, a principal in a NYC middle school, offered another view, saying the debate over de-leveling was "a distraction. Said Adams: “Our current system is not rigorous enough for any of our students. Our current system does not have structures and supports for all of our students to learn at their highest capacity.”

Adams felt that "attention should be turned to true educational advancement.  The achievement gap can be closed through thoughtful innovations." She proposed that the focus should be on the new national common core standards and that utilizing and blending learning models that customizes the instructional experience of the students.

“I see that common core is a positive challenge that should be embraced. One that will hopefully realign and re-imagine expectations that we should have for all of our students.”

Amy Dahn felt that the Board of Education should consider other options, in addition to combining levels, including Saturday programming, an extended school day for at-risk students, and a longer school year.

“From what I have read, in order to decrease the achievement gap, we must increase instructional time.”

The district has promised to address these concerns at a special meeting on Monday, December 5, 2011,* at 7:00 p.m. in the South Orange Middle School Little Theater, 70 North Ridgewood Rd South Orange, NJ. The purpose of the meeting is to "engage the public in a discussion about their concerns and interests regarding the results of middle school restructuring as they relate to future academic placement recommendations." A panel of administrators and teachers will join Board members to answer questions from the public.

* The Board of Education will meet on Monday, December 5, 2011 at 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. in the South Orange Middle School Little Theater, 70 Ridgewood Road, South Orange, NJ to hold a Special BOE Meeting to engage the public in a discussion about their concerns and interests regarding the results of middle school restructuring as they relate to future academic placement recommendations. A panel of administrators and teachers will join Board members to answer questions from the public. No action will be taken. (Note:  This meeting was originally scheduled for December 7.)