East Haven adopts "acceleration" math intervention after pilot shows measurable gains

East Haven School District math coaches told the Board of Education on May 27 that the district is shifting its elementary intervention strategy from traditional remediation to an "acceleration" model, saying early pilots produced measurable student gains.

The acceleration model keeps students working on grade‑level lessons while providing just‑in‑time instruction to close prerequisite gaps, math coach Randi Levine said. "We believe that every student deserves equitable access to high‑quality math instruction regardless of their current level," Levine said.

District staff said Ferrara School piloted the approach beginning in 2022 and reported improved outcomes. Mary Anne Brennan, Ferrara's math coach, said 54% of Ferrara students who received the accelerated interventions met or exceeded their ESSA growth targets and improved performance placements. At Tuttle School, district data presented by coaches showed that 47% of the entire student population met year‑end percent‑growth goals, while 66% of students who received accelerated intervention reached that growth — a 19‑percentage‑point difference.

The coaches described how acceleration differs from remediation: rather than pulling students permanently out of grade‑level instruction to reteach earlier content, teachers preteach only the critical prerequisite skills needed to access the current lesson and keep students engaged with grade‑level tasks. "Intervention should support access to grade‑level learning, not replace it," Allison Santoro, a math coach, said.

Brennan and other coaches said the approach includes curriculum mapping by clusters, teacher coaching cycles, student‑led centers, vocabulary supports for multilingual learners and performance tasks such as a third‑grade “Carnival Time” that integrates problem solving and discourse. Coaches described a template for backward planning that aligns standards horizontally across grades and links resources so the approach can be used with any core program.

District examples cited individual gains as well. Coaches said a student at Mamoguin had met 81% of the student's annual typical growth by midyear after accelerated interventions and that topic assessments and scale scores rose substantially in targeted domains — for example, coaches reported increases of 33 points in Numbers & Operations and 29 points in Operations & Algebraic Thinking on interim measures for a focused cohort.

Students quoted in presentation material expressed improved confidence. A recorded comment attributed to a Ferrara student, identified for the board as Maddox, said: "Now I don't hate math anymore. I actually understand what we're doing in class."

Superintendent's staff and the assistant superintendent, who introduced the panel, said the district's next step is finishing the grade‑3 acceleration materials by June and continuing work on grade 4, expanding coaching and providing professional development and learning pathways for teachers.

Coaches said the model advances the district's equity goals by ensuring students — including students of color, multilingual learners and students with disabilities — have access to grade‑level assignments and effective instruction. They asked the board for continued support for coaching time and for time to complete materials for additional grades.

The board applauded the presentation and asked for follow‑up reports on implementation and student results as the model scales.