Schools partner for grant

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By Janice Kurbjun
Times staff writer

A $215,000 grant is expected to help enhance the math program in schools in Carbon County School District 2.

Prior to applying for the Math and Science Partnership grant, District 2 Superintendent Bob Gates appealed to University of Wyoming’s science and math learning center for help with staff training to improve student math scores. The collaboration resulted in the federal grant and the inclusion of Carbon County School District 1 in the program. The proposed plan is designed to improve long-term student performance in math for students in every grade.

The program targets high-need school districts where at least 40 percent of the students qualify for free or reduced lunches or where the school didn’t make adequate yearly progress in math in 2007.

At Monday’s District 2 School Board meeting, board members heard from Robert Mayes, director of the UW science and math learning center. He plans to serve as a resource for the secondary education portion of the project, along with colleagues Michelle and Scott Chamberlin and Linda Hutchison.

“We’ve been diagnosing areas in District 2 where students are challenged and we’ve been identifying areas of need from the PAWS data and teacher data,” Mayes said. “Then we’ll develop units to teach in the classroom through collaborative partnership.”

UW’s work with District 1 officials should start this summer, following the same format.

The goal is to get teachers to think about how they teach the areas that are problematic.

In a truly collaborative effort, the two county districts will also partner with Math Recovery, an Australia-based teacher education program, to develop the elementary education staff. Representatives from the Math Recovery council plan to do on-site teacher training.

The program could mean changes to the schools’ curriculums, “depending on what the teachers find,” grant writer Cathy McAtee said. Otherwise, teachers may simply modify their delivery.

“Hopefully, the students will continue to grow in their love of math and begin applying it to real-world situations,” she said.