Duluth high schools add time for students to seek help

It was a large and at times tough crowd that East High School Principal Laurie Knapp attempted to woo Tuesday with explanation of a new academic time slot worked into the school day.
The school’s juniors and seniors filled the 800-seat auditorium and lined the walls on the first day of class as they took their turn learning about the changes, their collective pitch rising when they heard there would be a mandatory 30 minutes of reading every Friday. But when Knapp asked for raised hands showing who will have after-school activities taking up time, hundreds shot up.
The 30 minutes a day would give students time to do school work, get help where it’s needed and develop a relationship with a teacher they’d stay with for that period for the remainder of their high school career, in an advisory class, she told them.
“Your job here is to learn and our job is to teach you,” Knapp said.
Students at East and Denfeld experienced last-minute schedule shuffles following a vote by the Duluth Federation of Teachers late last week to approve the contract change that allows what’s being called the “WIN” period. It stands for “what I need,” and is a pilot program broadly intended to improve student performance and help students do well in school.
“We’ve seen a number of kids fail in math and science, especially,” Knapp said. “It’s an opportunity to put those interventions in the school day where kids can actually take advantage of getting the help they need.”
State scores released last week, for example, showed that only 55 percent of East juniors were proficient in math while just 27 percent of their Denfeld counterparts attained that level.
Knapp said research shows struggling students do better when they get help during the school day. Large numbers of kids at Denfeld and East get to school right before it starts and leave as soon as it’s over. Some don’t have transportation other than what’s provided by the district and some have after-school jobs and activities.
East senior Nikki Samuelson is on the varsity volleyball team. She gets home from practice at 6 p.m., so homework gets late for her.
“It’s really time-consuming and we’re out of town a lot,” she said. “I would like the time during school.”
Denfeld math teacher Tim White will be working with students who need extra help in that subject area, so he won’t have an advisory class. He’s not sure how students will take to it, noting some will take advantage and some won’t.
“There are a lot of students who can benefit from an extra half hour every day,” he said. “It’s worth trying.”
The schedule at East, for example, has been set up to give 30 minutes of newly state-mandated college and career preparation on Mondays in a student’s regular advisory period, with Tuesday through Thursday offering 30 minutes a day for students to head to a teacher who can help them with something specific, like chemistry or algebra II. It might be for two days or two weeks, Knapp said, because it’s meant to work as a time for the student to catch up.
If no help is needed, students can stay with their regular advisory teacher in a study hall environment.
Students in yearbook and journalism classes can go to those, and other enrichment ideas will be developed, Knapp said. On Friday everyone will read. Knapp said other schools in the state have done this, and it’s raised literacy scores.
Teachers will refer students to get help, or they can ask for it themselves.
East, which has had three lunches because of its higher population, lost one to make room for the changes. A few minutes were shaved off each class to cobble together those 30 minutes, coupled with the nine minutes added to the high school day last year by the School Board. Knapp said extra lunch lines and tables were added to the remaining lunches, hampered even more by a mostly closed campus starting this year.
East senior Paul Manning, a member of the group, Students for the Future, said the junior/senior lunch Tuesday was “packed.” He said the new period is a good idea for students having difficulty, but that it’s more about meeting benchmarks and raising scores than finding things for students to enjoy.
“My problem with it is it’s not helping people find their passions and not getting them excited to do things in real life,” he said. “It would be great if those 30 minutes could do that.”  
Also approved via the vote - which passed with 90 percent of the membership’s approval - is time for “professional learning communities.” It’s time within the work day for teachers to gather with others and talk about student test scores and teaching methods or to observe each other. In Duluth, teachers have had to do that outside of the work day. Money was approved through the operating levy to pay for paraprofessionals to cover study halls and lunch periods teachers would normally man to free up this time.
This is a better use of professional time, said Bernie Burnham, president of the teacher’s union.
Teachers working together, she said, will improve classroom instruction.
“We go in our classrooms and close our door,” Knapp said of teaching without collaboration. “Now the door is open. It’s going to be a change.”