Malcolm C. Hursey Montessori is helping all students develop the world-class skills and life and career characteristics of the Profile of the Graduate by fulfilling its mission as a partial magnet Montessori school of choice. The tenet of a Montessori education is that a child learns best in an enriched and supportive environment, where exploration, discovery, collaboration, and creative thinking are the norm, and where integrity, self-direction, a global perspective, and interpersonal skills are emphasized, all under the guidance and encouragement of a trained, caring teacher. This year, elementary/middle school achievement data for SC Ready ELA indicate both areas of improvement and areas of concern. Overall SC Ready ELA scores for elementary students decreased from 48.6% to 46.8%. Overall scores for SC Ready ELA middle school students increased from 31.3% to 50%. For our African American students, elementary SC Ready ELA scores decreased slightly from 20% to 19.5% while scores for African American middle school students increased a whopping 21.2 percentage points, from 13.2% to 34.4%. We will address our decreased scores by providing after-school tutoring, providing teachers with additional professional development in ELA, and looking at student data by subgroups during weekly PLCs. We will continue to implement our ELA curriculum in our middle school grades, incorporate adapted digital content practice time for students, and use iReady for our 6th-grade students based on District approval. This year, our SC Ready math data indicate areas of improvement for our elementary students while our middle school students showed high rates of improvement. Overall SC Ready math scores for elementary students decreased from 47.7% to 34.2% while scores for African American elementary students decreased from 15.4% to 12.0%. We will continue strategies to support growth in Math such as using data-driven decisions to support students through Page 16 of 36 extended day and extended year/summer programming. The utilization of formative data within and across elementary grade levels PLCs to improve achievement is a key focus area. This year, our SC Ready math scores for middle school students increased from 23.4% to 28.1%, while African American middle school students increased from 7.9% to 19.0%. We have recently provided our high-achieving 6th-grade students with the opportunity to participate in 7th and 8th-grade math learning experiences. This has positively impacted our growth and overall scores. We will continue to focus on our mathematics curriculum, practices, and state standards in our instructional practices. By emphasizing multiple approaches to solving mathematical problems, students develop the critical thinking skills they need to apply their knowledge given unique scenarios. Additionally, educators have supplemented shelf lessons with student work that addresses needs based on more frequently gathered formative data. Therefore, we will have a concentrated focus on teaching and learning mathematical concepts through small differentiated flexible grouping and continued professional development. This year our Algebra 1 End-Of-Course exam scores are an area of strength for our school. The percentage of grade 8 students scoring a C or higher on this exam increased from 5.6% to 43.0%. We will continue to use NWEA and iReady to monitor and assess students' progress, offer more opportunities for younger students to participate in higher-level math teaching, and increase our enrollment numbers for Algebra 1.
Timothy G. Schavel, Ed.D. Principal
Robert Fludd, SIC Chairman
