East Haven School District reviews 6–12 data, outlines interventions and curriculum pilots

Assistant Superintendent Lisa opened a 6–12 academic workshop by running district projections and dashboards that staff will use to target intervention work this year. She told educators that without further growth only a small share of current middle‑grade students would be proficient on Smarter Balanced, and urged a focus on “stretch” growth sustained over multiple years to close performance gaps.

Principal Darcy Joyon said middle‑grade cohorts show strong in‑year gains on I‑Ready but lose much of that progress over the summer. "Our theory of action this year is that if we really implement a cohesive strategy that drives deep encoding so that kids remember what it is that they're learning throughout the summer," Joyon said, "then they'll shift from surface level memorization to durable knowledge." Joyon outlined classroom practices, walk‑through coaching and collegial visits designed to increase retention.

Curriculum leads described literacy and math strategies grounded in evidence. Joyon and others highlighted reciprocal teaching and paired reading — methods they cited from John Hattie’s meta‑analyses that have large reported effect sizes — and said those strategies are being embedded across content areas to raise engagement and comprehension. The ELA team described using mentor texts, choral reading and anchor charts to provide consistent Tier‑1 literacy routines across English, social studies and science classes.

Assistant Principal Nate Testro presented the Amplify Science pilot at the middle school, saying the curriculum emphasizes phenomenon‑driven inquiry and three‑dimensional NGSS practices and includes digital simulations and aligned end‑of‑unit assessments. "The goal is that science teachers will demonstrate high fidelity implementation of the Amplify Science curriculum," Testro said, noting unit assessments directly map to SBAC practice items to improve assessment alignment.

Leaders described data and platform work intended to make interventions more timely. Staff demonstrated Panorama dashboards that combine academic, attendance and SEL indicators and an intervention dashboard that tracks whether strategy goals are met across students. District staff said they will expand Naviance to support career planning and a vision‑of‑the‑graduate portfolio, with family access planned by the holiday break.

At the high school, instructional leaders described an Academic Seminar (75‑minute, every‑other‑day course) and a co‑taught Foundations of Math class for students with large gaps, plus Algebra 1 seminar offerings that add a fourth day of math for targeted students. The MTSS and attendance teams outlined watch groups created in Panorama and an "Attendance Success" after‑school program for about 40 chronically absent students that will combine academic support and career exploration.

Presenters pointed to early signs of progress in climate and behavior measures: administrators reported reductions in behavioral incidents and suspensions and modest declines in chronic absenteeism after implementing restorative practices and targeted outreach. Staff said they will continue progress monitoring, scale interventions where effective and report outcomes to the board.

Next steps noted in the presentations included ongoing implementation of pilot materials, continued pacing‑guide use, expanded Naviance family access, embedded PD with outside trainers in January for math discourse, and quarterly updates to the board on BOI/MTSS outcomes.

The workshop portion concluded with a student presentation from the woodworking class detailing a Veterans Day product fundraiser that raised $210 toward a $1,000 goal while providing students project‑based experience.