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Board accepts numeracy monitoring report; district calls for intensified math work after mixed results
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Summary
The board accepted a monitoring report on second‑grade numeracy showing modest gains districtwide and notable variability across campuses and student groups; staff said math gains lag literacy and require sustained curriculum stability, teacher training and hands‑on instruction.
The Austin ISD Board of Trustees voted Thursday to accept the superintendent’s monitoring report on Goal 2, second‑grade numeracy intervention, after a presentation that described modest district gains but larger historical variability in math outcomes.
District leaders told trustees the percent of second graders in the NWEA MAP math recommended‑for‑intervention range fell to 35% in spring 2025 from 37% in 2024, narrowly exceeding the first‑year target. Staff cautioned that math progress remains uneven across student groups and campuses and that the system lacks the steady, districtwide momentum already seen in literacy.
Assistant Superintendent Dr. Mary Anne Maxwell and Jennifer Jones, director of STEM, led the presentation and said the district has shifted to STEMScopes as the adopted K–5 math curriculum while increasing professional learning and curating materials. Jennifer Jones said the district needed to rebuild teacher familiarity with conceptual, hands‑on math instruction that declined during the pandemic and to expand math‑specific intervention resources.
Trustees heard that the largest spring‑to‑spring gains were for African American students (a 5 percentage‑point decrease in recommended‑for‑intervention rates), while the district missed targets for economically disadvantaged students and American Indian students. District staff showed a longer run of variable results in math, with several years of ups and downs linked to earlier curriculum changes and uneven professional development.
The presentation cited outlier campuses that reduced intervention rates substantially across the year and identified shared success factors there: consistent use of adopted curriculum, strong PLC routines, weekly data analysis, common intervention resources and intentional observation/feedback cycles.
Trustees and staff discussed MTSS documentation and the availability of high‑quality math intervention materials. Trustees asked for campus‑by‑campus growth data and a disaggregation of special education students who have a math‑specific learning disability. Staff said most students with IEPs take NWEA, but that precise subgroup analysis would require further data pulls.
The board unanimously accepted the numeracy monitoring report.
Next steps include expanding professional learning layers for principals, APs and coaches; integrating math into the lighthouse/learning‑lab model; tightening MTSS progress‑monitoring practices; and curating additional intervention materials for math. Staff told trustees they will prioritize observation, coaching and PLC improvements and report progress in coming months.
Provenance
Topic intro: “We will continue our discussion on student achievement and have a presentation on scorecard goal 2 numeracy, our goal progress measure 2.1.” (transcript block starting at 8277.785 — evidence excerpt)
Topic finish: “That concludes our math report and we look forward to your questions.” (transcript block starting at 9882.875 — evidence excerpt)
