superintendent's Message:
Dr. Steven Adamowski
Dear Norwalk Families and Community Members,
Norwalk Public Schools is…
The most successful city school system in Connecticut.
Norwalk students as a whole exceed state average achievement while high need students have the smallest achievement gap. Students’ needs and interests are met through a wide range of school and program choices that promote diversity and broaden achievement. All students are taught by exemplary educators in nurturing, safe, and attractive schools. Students read on grade level by end of grade 3, leave 8th grade equipped to do rigorous high school work and graduate from high school college and career ready.
This Vision involves the work of everyone in Norwalk – every member of our staff, students, parents and partners. So, we begin every school year by re-focusing on our Vision, the progress we’ve made, and the next steps on the journey to be the most successful city school system in Connecticut.
The seminal achievement of our schools in the past year was the incredible gains documented by the 12 indicators of the Connecticut Next Generation Accountability Plan. Our 56 point gain was the highest growth of any City and second highest of the 167 school districts in our State. Norwalk’s accountability index of 74 is now higher than the State as a whole, closing another important gap for our students.
We have some very promising preliminary results on last April’s Smarter Balanced (SBAC) testing in grades 3-8, with Norwalk’s lowest performing schools leading the District with the greatest gains.
In reading/English language arts, the largest gains across all grades occurred at Kendall, Tracey, Brookside and Jefferson.
The largest gains across all grades in math were achieved at Kendall, Roton, West Rocks, Fox Run, Nathan Hale and Jefferson.
In 2017-18, overall the greatest improvement of any school as measured by State testing was made by Kendall Elementary. On average, Kendall logged a gain of 10.4% in Reading and 12.3% in Math.
At the high school level, SAT scores lagged with a continuing 10 percent achievement gap between the average SAT scores of Norwalk students and their Connecticut peers. This was expected. However, this year marks the unprecedented investment of 20 new high school teaching positions to implement the new High School Program of Study, now organized into pathways to graduation; to eliminate study halls that were instituted in the 1970’s; and to move to a 26 credit graduation requirement beginning with 9th and 10th graders this year. Students who take more classes and higher level classes do better on the SAT, which measures general achievement related to college and career readiness. Given that all students must take the SAT, we can no longer afford to have only some students take a full schedule of rigorous and relevant course work.
In addition, for the first time beginning this year, all 9th graders are being issued Chromebooks that they will use as a ubiquitous learning tool, both in the classroom and for homework, for the next four years.
Overall, in 2017-18, our high needs students – special education (14%), English Language Learners (15%) and lower income students (51%) -- have continued to grow at a rate higher than their peers. We believe this reflects the success of our staff in providing the Tier II and Tier III interventions they are now receiving. More students than ever before experienced a learning opportunity this year, as we extended summer learning through grade 5, and added the Springboard Program at Kendall and Jefferson. That summer learning experience will enable students to be more successful in the next school year. However, this also suggests that our next steps for improvement and closing the gaps must be focused on the enhancement and differentiation of “Tier I” instruction, which is the instruction that all students receive.
Within this context, our student data suggests at least three priorities for NPS as we go into the 2018-19 school year:
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