248 Picked in State Awards Program : ‘Distinguished’ Is Word for These Schools

They were middle-class schools and poor schools, brainy schools and “average” schools, schools full of refugees and schools where everyone spoke English. They could not, on first glance, be more dissimilar.

But the 248 winners of the state Department of Education’s first Distinguished Elementary School Awards--to be presented in Los Angeles today--all have at least one trait in common: They helped students make great leaps in achievement, either by raising below-average test scores to average heights or making high scores dramatically higher.

“Achievement can mean two things,” said state School Supt. Bill Honig, who established the awards program last year to recognize and encourage excellence. “There are the schools in the top quarter . . . and the schools that are growing. Achievement also means coming from point A to point B . . . improving rapidly.”

The selection process began last October, when results of the California Assessment Program test of basic academic skills were released. The state Department of Education screened the scores of the state’s 4,500 elementary schools and found 559 that either scored consistently high marks or had shown rapid progress.

Those schools were required to answer a detailed questionnaire about academic goals, instructional practices and the roles of parents, teachers and administrators, according to Mary Ann Overton, a state education official who coordinated the program.

The 283 schools that survived that stage of the review were then subjected to first-hand scrutiny. A team of evaluators that included teachers and administrators from the nominated schools spent a day at each site. As a result of the visits, 248 were judged to be distinguished schools.

“When you walked onto any of these campuses, you got the feeling this is really a live-wire school,” said Marvin R. Matthews, a consultant to the Los Angeles County Office of Education who helped evaluate the finalists. “When you visited the classrooms, kids were working--and not grudgingly. There was a magic present.”

At Balboa Gifted Magnet School in Northridge, for example, the operative words seemed to be creative chaos. One day last week, students were holding talent shows, preparing a French lunch (part of a program on Romance languages) and working in teams to solve a computer-generated puzzle about how to control a rampant deer population. Nearly every classroom was decorated with student art.

“One of the keys to being in this crazy place is you’ve got to be flexible,” said Principal Phyllis Marquardt, whom teachers praised for allowing creative approaches to flourish.

The school consistently ranks in the top 2% of elementary schools on the state achievement test. That may seem to leave little room for improvement, but Balboa’s scores have continued to climb. For instance, sixth-grade California Assessment Program reading scores rose from 400 to 453 last year, which moved Balboa from the 98th to the 99th percentile; the average state score was 263.

In all the schools, evaluators found strong principals, a high degree of parent involvement and teachers who showed initiative and an ability to blend disciplines. The schools had science classes that involved a good deal of writing, literature classes that incorporated history, and math classes that found ways to include art.

At another of the winning schools, Eagle Rock School in northeast Los Angeles, the judges found all these elements. They also noted a collaborative spirit that drew together the diverse elements of the school, which includes several classes of gifted and educationally handicapped youngsters.

According to Principal Bernice Hallam, the school is gearing up for Dinosaur Day next week, which will feature a simulated archeological dig, “dinosaur cookies” and other activities. Several classrooms have designed special projects, such as the combination third- and fourth-grade class of Barbara Ishida, whose students worked daily for three months building a 20-foot papier-mache brontosaurus.

For two fifth- and sixth-grade gifted classes, teacher Beverly Glassford developed an archeology project in which each class created an ancient society--a language, life style, economic system, family structure, religion and form of government--and designed artifacts that represented aspects of the culture.

The students have been excavating each others’ artifacts, which were buried in a dirt pit on the campus. Next Thursday, there will be a showdown to see which class was able to decipher the most about the other’s imaginary society.

At Ralph Waldo Emerson School in the Garvey School District, which serves parts of Monterey Park and Rosemead, there were no unusual events taking place last week. But students were hard at work at this predominantly Asian and Latino immigrant school, where every gain is the product of well-laid plans.

Principal Bruce Davis said the school is geared to raising the achievement level of the students. Students at Emerson, on average, perform below the state norm, a reflection of the high percentage of students who speak a language other than English. According to Davis, 71% of the 600 students speak one of 15 foreign languages and dialects, including Spanish, Cantonese, Mandarin, Cambodian, Vietnamese, Thai, Tagalog and Burmese. Over the last five years, the percentage of students from low-income families has steadily risen.

Daily attendance, however, is high, averaging 95%, and test scores have risen an average of 24 points in reading, writing and math over the last four years. Davis said the improvement is due to deliberate strategies to strengthen the skills in which students are weak and clear communication of the school’s high expectations not only to the staff but to parents--which entails providing translators and sending school notices home in four major languages.

The principal also links the gains to a well-defined system of rewards. Each week, Davis awards ribbons to students who have demonstrated progress. Since 1980, he has handed out 10,000 ribbons and made an equal number of congratulatory phone calls to the students’ parents.

Sixth-grader Connie Phan, 12, who has earned several ribbons, said she believes that the program makes the school special. “If you work hard, they give you something in return. It makes you feel proud--and glad to be here.”

Here, by school district, are the 38 schools in Los Angeles County that have been named Distinguished Elementary Schools by the state Department of Education:

Arcadia Unified School District: Hugo Reid. Baldwin Park Unified: Geddes, Tracy, Walnut. Bonita Unified: Arma J. Shull. Charter Oak Unified: Cedargrove. Downey Unified: Imperial. Garvey: John Marshall, Emerson. Glendale Unified: Glenoaks, La Crescenta, Marshall, Mountain. Los Angeles Unified: Balboa, Commonwealth, Eagle Rock, Franklin, Melrose, Meyler, San Fernando, Taper. Lowell Joint: Jordan. Mountain View: La Primaria. Newhall: Meadows, Wiley. Palmdale: Yucca. Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified: Montemalaga, Silver Spur. Pasadena Unified: Jefferson. Rowland Unified: Hurley, Jellick, Oswalt. San Gabriel: McKinley. San Marino Unified: Carver. Saugus Union: Highlands, Rosedell, Skyblue Mesa. South Pasadena Unified: Marengo.