schools
Helping students, one school and one teacher at a time
On an early February morning at Stedman Elementary School, the pressure was high. Two students vomited. A few cried at their desks. Another imagined goblins might get him if he failed. It was the day the third-graders took their first Colorado Student Assessment Program exams, and the 8- and 9-year-olds were all nerves. Students rubbed lucky “Zap CSAP” lapel pins. They repeated mantras of test-taking techniques and practiced positive self-talk taught to them by their teacher, Dawn Romero. The reading test — given to third-graders weeks before exams in math and writing so results can be used to help struggling kids before the end of the school year — was a stop on the long road to get most Stedman students performing at grade level or better by summer. Only six of Romero’s...
