Engaging, empowering and enabling each student to achieve academic excellence and meet the goals of college and career readiness. This stated mission of Barnwell School District 19 continues to hold true as we work to ensure every student meets or exceeds the academic standards set by the state of South Carolina. Although ambitious, this goal is absolutely attainable. In the Blackville-Hilda Public Schools, the curriculum is aligned with the South Carolina College and Career Ready Standards. Our goal is to ensure our students receive rigorous, relevant and engaging instruction while also working to make sure every student is college and career ready upon high school graduation. We have a solid foundation on which to build in Barnwell 19. To accomplish our goals, Barnwell School District 19 embraced the research of the 90-90-90 schools to improve overall academic achievement. These are schools where 90% or more of the students were eligible for free and reduced lunch, 90% or more were members of ethnic minority groups, and 90% or more met the district/state academic standards in reading or another area (Reeves, 2000). Success was achieved by focusing on academic achievement, making clear curriculum choices, frequently assessing student progress, providing multiple opportunities for improvement, placing an emphasis on nonfiction writing and using collaborative scoring of student work. We also know that reading is fundamentally important to student achievement and test data shows it as an area of need for Blackville-Hilda students. During the 2019-2020 school-year, we will continue our implementation of Balanced Literacy, a comprehensive literacy program including components of reading and writing with opportunities to respond critically and thoughtfully to texts and learning. (Routman, 2000) Also continuing in Barnwell 19 is our focus on High Progress Literacy and helping our teachers and students understand content literacy. Teachers will receive extensive, on-going professional development from consultants, met weekly in department/grade level meeting to review data from benchmarks and use the S.C. College and Career Ready Standards to guide instruction. To support our students’ growth in math, teachers will continue to focus on how to help students think about math and the processes they use instead just getting the right answer. Across all content areas, nonfiction writing is used daily to assess and deepen student learning and thinking. Research tells us that reading, writing, and content learning are related and supports the idea that writing to learn improves higher-order reasoning skills. Additionally, it helps students inquire, clarify, or reflect on content. Barnwell School District 19 is committed to improving each student’s education through research-based programs and innovative teaching techniques. We believe the faculty and staff members of Blackville-Hilda Public Schools to be some of the finest of any school district in this state and up to the task at hand. Continual support will be given to our administrators, teachers, and support staff by establishing clear expectations, providing relevant training and professional development, and rewarding the outstanding work these professionals carry out daily. The work to establish and maintain a positive climate in every school in our district continues. We have upgraded facilities, work to establish an atmosphere where every child can learn, and continue to engage our stakeholders as equal partners in our children's education. Please join us as we accept the challenge, change lives, and celebrate success.
