By Linda Conner Lambeck

WESTPORT — Learning losses during the COVID-19 pandemic struck Westport students like others across the nation.

Still, it wasn’t enough for the Board of Education to hear this week that local students’ scoring deficits aren’t as severe as elsewhere.

Board members wanted to know the extent of learning lost, how important the losses are to students’ future learning and how, as much as possible, the losses can be remediated.

“I hope when we get to the budget process, we make sure it is our number-one priority,” board member Dorie Hordon said during a meeting Monday at Staples High School.

Extra tutoring and support are being provided through grant funding, which is expected to expire at the end of the current school year.

Math performance hardest hit

Based on multiple measures, it appears that student performance was set back during the pandemic, the board was told, with math affected more than reading.

On state-required Smarter Balance Assessment tests, the percentage of students reaching proficiency in math is lower than pre-pandemic in all but third grade.

In grade five, the drop in proficiency was 8 percentage points, and in eighth grade, 6 percentage points.

Pre-pandemic, between 76 and 82 percent of students were proficient across grades three through eight. In 2021-22, it was 70 to 84 percent proficient, with third graders at 84 percent.

In reading, third graders also did better than pre-pandemic. Other grades performed lower, by 4 to 7 percentage points.

Between 80 and 89 percent of elementary students were proficient in reading pre-pandemic. In 2021-22, it was between 75 and 85 percent.

School district officials also looked at how the same students performed over time, but it was difficult because there has been such an influx of new students that the cohorts do not match.

That also could have affected the lower performance, Supt. of Schools Thomas Scarice told the board.

Beyond the state test, the district uses a math and reading assessment from the Northwest Evaluation Association, or NWEA, that is given in the fall and winter in kindergarten through eighth grade.

Outcomes from that assessment were more encouraging, according to Anthony Buono, assistant superintendent for teaching and learning.

NWEA mean scores this October in math were higher than pre-pandemic in kindergarten and first grade, about the same in third and fourth grades, and lower in grades two and five through eight.

In the NWEA reading assessment, students were performing at or above pre-pandemic levels in all but first through third grades.

Beyond test scores, Ali Moran, coordinator of elementary curriculum, said the district uses formative assessments, or daily classroom activities, along with observation and student work to gauge student progress and to drive instruction.

There are also district-wide chapter assessments.

In math, across grades one though five, an average of 89 percent of students met chapter one benchmarks. In reading, 80 percent of students met independent reading benchmarks for the first trimester.

“Is that good?” board Vice Chairwoman Liz Heyer asked, wondering if the goal shouldn’t be 100 percent.

Moran called those results really good and higher than the expected for the first unit.

Scarice: Hybrid learning took a toll

Scarice told the school board in a memo prior to the meeting that the pandemic affected student performance because there was a dramatic reduction in language arts instruction when classes were conducted in hybrid mode. Time spent on language arts was cut by as much as two hours a day.

There also were modifications to curriculum, an increase in explicit instruction and independent work, and a decrease in collaborative activities where students worked together.

During the pandemic, there was also a decrease in experiences outside school, including unstructured time and afterschool activities.

As a result, some students need to work on self-regulating and interaction skills, the board was told.

Buono said he even notices a difference at the high school level.

In his first year in the district, Buono said he was struck at how much discourse there was between students at Staples. More than anywhere else, he said.

Today, the halls of Staples are much quieter, he said.

For students who struggle, there is a Response to Intervention, or RTI program. The number of students receiving the service is higher at the elementary school level than pre-pandemic.

In addition, more emphasis is being placed on giving students social and emotional support and small group instruction. There is expanded math and science lab time, an additional writing lab at Staples and more math interventionists.

Heyer wanted to know how many students are receiving RTI support, how many math interventionists there are and if there are enough.

Buono said that while there are enough this year, the district may have to add to the budget when grant funding ends.

Return to a full curriculum 

Moran told the board that the district is back to teaching the full curriculum.

“Nothing is cut out,” she said.

“We know how to improve scores,” Scarice told the board. “We want to improve scores in a positive way.”

The district, he said, needs an effective social and emotional learning curriculum where executive function is explicitly taught.

Hordon asked how social and emotional learning would help students recover from COVID learning loss in math.

Moran said math anxiety is real and helping students to prioritize, work with a partner, share thinking and focus on procedures and routines will help.

Routines and expectations taken for granted in prior years, like how to use a math journal and not lose your place by using a post-it note, need to be explicitly taught in many cases, Moran said.

Wendy McCaughey, a parent of students at Greens Farms Elementary School, told the board that community building efforts at her school have been important in helping her child feel comfortable participating in class.

“It’s a piece of the puzzle that is really important,” she said.

Board member Robert Harrington asked if there were barriers to bringing back collaborative work and work on executive functioning skills. He wondered if interventions need to start sooner.

“I feel we are sleepwalking in a post-pandemic world,” he said. “There is a problem here that is not going to go away. “

He said he worries there are bigger issues the district is not getting its arms around and said there needs to be support for social and emotional learning.

Freelance writer Linda Conner Lambeck, a reporter for more than four decades at the Connecticut Post and other Hearst publications, is a member of the Education Writers Association.