NEW HAVEN, Conn. — The New Haven Public School district, released new reading and math scores, and parents, community leaders, and advocates are labeling it a citywide education crisis.
Jamiela Logan is a parent with two kids in NHPS. When she heard about the newly released data revealing a significant decline in students reading and math scores, she said it was distressing.
The numbers showed that only 23% of students were on grade level with ELA, and 12% were on grade level in math.
"You think we're at a crisis with violence? We're at a crisis for education," passionately said Dr. Rev. Boise Kimber, The Greater New Haven Clergy Association.
In a news conference on Wednesday, the Greater New Haven Clergy Association and community leaders said this is an educational crisis, and the numbers are at some of the lowest the city has seen.
"If we don't teach these kids properly how to read and how do math and to deal what we're going through-- we will fail our children," said Dr. Rev. Kimber.
In the conference, Dr. Rev. Kimber said he's demanding Mayor Elicker and the Board of Education immediately address this crisis.
Elicker said that's what they've been doing all along. He said they knew the pandemic would create this problem which is why millions have been invested in funding youth programming and more.
"Our kids are often times facing many more challenges that are suburban counterparts and we need to see much more investment end guidance counselors and more programming," explained Elicker. " We're doing a lot as an outline, but we need to do more."
Elicker said other municipalities are dealing with this issue, and studies have shown a gap beyond math and reading scores.
"In particular, an exacerbation of the divide between black and brown children and white children as far as educational scores," said Elicker. "That exists well before COVID-19, but COVID-19 has made it much worse."
He said he doesn't think any city leader or advocate should deny that the children in New Haven deserve so much more. However, he said the solution depends on the city, the state, and surrounding communities to invest even more in youth.
New Haven Public Schools released a statement, reading in part:
Addressing student learning loss attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic is an urgent priority for the New Haven Public Schools. Adding to the urgency is the long-term challenge of equalizing educational opportunities for every student in the district.
While the city and district work to address the issue, Logan said, it's important to remember it takes a village for kids to succeed.
"It's like co-parenting so the teachers have them and are trying to assist them and help them during the day and at night when they come home, you just got to help them and make sure that all their works stick with them," said Logan.
New Haven Public Schools FULL statement:
Addressing student learning loss attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic is an urgent priority for the New Haven Public Schools. Adding to the urgency is the long-term challenge of equalizing educational opportunities for every student in the district.
Data from the most recent academic year reflect learning loss attributable to many factors, and in particular, interrupted learning. After a long period of remote instruction, we had 54 percent chronic absenteeism for the school year just ended. While reading and math scores showed marked improvement over the course of the 2021-2022 academic year, they began and ended at a level below what had been the norm prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. As will be seen when the State of Connecticut releases its comprehensive data for districts across the state, New Haven is not alone in experiencing these losses.
In both reading and math, we are pursuing teaching approaches that enable us to target instruction to individual students, to ensure that they not only progress, but make up lost ground.
In the coming academic year, we will pilot comprehensive reading programs that meet the new state legislative mandate and, based on how our students are faring, we will adopt a new program for the district.
Based on our current data, New Haven Public Schools has developed an enhanced reading plan that will be shared with staff to receive further input. We continue to focus our instruction on the components of the science of reading: oral language, phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, letter name fluency, reading comprehension, and reading fluency. We will commence the year for the early grades with an intense focus on oral language, phonemic awareness and phonics.
RELATED: State announces COVID back-to-school guidelines, relaxes protocols for 2022-2023 school year
Professional training for staff will be intense and ongoing. We continue to collaborate with the state department of education to receive training for staff.
Regular reports to the Board of Education on the progress of our plans will be disseminated. We also seek the engagement of all members of the New Haven community in supporting our students and teachers with the work ahead in the new school year.
Raquel Harrington is the race and culture reporter at FOX61 News. She can be reached at rharrington@fox61.com. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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