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Everything was jumbled. The words, the sentences, the thin strips of paper. It was early at R.
B. Stall High School and some the sophomores in Allie McGee's English II class were still rubbing the sleep out of their eyes. The assignment? Piecing together a passage from the novel "The House on Mango Street," and sussing out what goes where — the beginning, the thesis, the ending — without having read it before.
McGee gave them 15 minutes to figure it out. Suddenly, a flurry of motion, hands sliding long strips of white paper trying to figure out the answers. The teacher paced the room, stopping occasionally to see how each group was doing.
Allie McGee, an English instructional coach at R. B. Stall High School, talks Raymundo Barrios Silva through a class assignment, Monday, October 28, 2024, in North Charleston.
Usually, McGee would be the only instructor in the classroom, but now she had company. Sitting at a desk, not far away, was English teacher Tiffanee Sundberg, who was helping another group of students work through the assignment. Other instructors were also in the room.
"Alright now," Sundberg said, "you're going to do the heavy lifting." Then, she guided them. "Is there anything here that works as the introduction?" The two students, both young men, one Black, one Hispanic, thought about it before the Hispanic student reached for one of the strips of paper.
Both looked back at her for approval. "OK," she said, encouraging them further. "Let's try that there.
" Tiffanee Sundberg, left, listens to Gabby Wright walk through a classroom assignment at R.B. Stall High School, Monday, October 28, 2024, in North Charleston.
Fostering this collaborative environment in classrooms, where there are several teachers instead of one, is a practice that some Charleston County school principals now are prioritizing thanks to extra money they're getting this year. The supplemental cash is a result of a new "weighted student funding model." Teachers help students through assignments in instructional classrooms at R.
B. Stall High School, Monday, October 28, 2024, in North Charleston. The strategy took effect this school year.
All public schools in Charleston County are receiving additional dollars to help them boost achievement among students in poverty, those who have disabilities and kids whose first language is not English. Weighted student funding is a financial model that distributes school resources based on need. Charleston County School District is the first in South Carolina to implement the strategy in an effort to close historic achievement gaps.
The Charleston County School District is implementing a new Weighted School Funding model for allotting funds across schools. How does it work and how will it affect students? The amount of money a school receives normally depends on the number of students enrolled. With a weighted student funding formula, Charleston schools receive their normal share, plus additional dollars based on the size of the school's population and the number of students who are categorized as "pupils in poverty," "multilingual learners" or "students with disabilities.
" A formula determines the amount each school gets. For every three eligible students in elementary school, the district provides funding for an imaginary fourth. In middle school, every four students deemed in poverty, multilingual or with a disability triggers funding for an imaginary fifth student.
The ratio for high school is 6 to 1 — for every six eligible students, a hypothetical seventh is funded. Weighted student funding, meant to address inequities and increase school autonomy, is increasingly used across the country. Large districts such as New York City, Boston, Denver, Atlanta, Houston and Chicago adopted the model several years ago.
Experts note that the formula is not a silver bullet that can fix all problems, but districts improve in distributing funds more equitably across all schools. Each principal has the freedom to spend the extra money on what they believe is in the best interests of their students. Huggins and Chief Finance Officer Daniel Prentice emphasized that the money cannot be used to pay for administrators, construction, maintenance, conference trips or professional development.
It is only meant for students who fall into one of those three categories. The Post and Courier’s Education Lab focuses on issues and policies that affect South Carolina’s education system. It is supported by donations and grants to the nonprofit Public Service and Investigative Fund.
For more information, and to donate, go to https://post andcourierfund.com/ Once the new model was approved, along with the fiscal year 2025 district budget, principals across the district began brainstorming with their staff on how to use the additional funds. Steve Larson, R.
B. Stall's principal, said tracking progress and showing results is paramount. "One of the biggest fears in allocating additional resources to schools is, is it going to do anything?" he said.
"It is an expectation that whatever we are investing in we collect data, not only to bring up our end-of-course scores but to make outcomes better for kids." Superintendent Anita Huggins has long known that the only way to drive improvements across schools was to find a way to serve groups of students who, historically, have not been successful, she said in an interview. Whenever she spoke with principals about student performance, a persistent theme was the need for more staffing resources centered around populations of children who are outperformed by their White peers, she said.
Cindy Inestroza Flores looks up watching a board where her third grade teachers Alyssa Wimmer and Maggie VanThullenar teach multiplication, Tuesday, October 29, 2024, in North Charleston. "For me, it is seeing where are the gaps and doing something about it," Huggins said. "We can talk about it all day long, but if we don't do something it's never going to change, so the WSF is our effort to do something about the persistent problem of underachievement, particularly for those (students) who are underserved, those in poverty, those who have challenges.
" After researching and speaking with superintendents in other states who have implemented the model successfully, she began thinking about how to bring it to Charleston, she said. When Huggins first pitched the model in March , she said its intent would be to level the playing field regardless of student demographics, and to sustain the academic gains seen by programs funded by federal Covid-19 pandemic relief funds. The district set aside $32.
8 million of their general operating fund for this purpose. The weighted funding strategy became a topic of high interest through this year's budget season amongst teachers, principals and board members, who green-lighted the initiative after multiple meetings and conversations with district leadership. Huggins further explains weighted student funding vision for Charleston County schools Huggins has told board members it would take three to five years to determine whether the funding model is benefitting students.
It takes time to measure success with these types of district-wide strategies, she said. In the process of tracking success over time, district staff will use a system to correlate student achievement with the resources given to the schools, Huggins said. This will help determine if the model is working or not, or if adjustments are needed.
"If it's not working we need to figure out what will," Huggins said. "We have to be honest and transparent about the data so we can figure out how to support kids, if this isn't a way to do that." Stephanie Payerle, the lead instructional coach at R.
B. Stall High School, chats with students at their desks about class work, Monday, October 28, 2024, in North Charleston. Larson's plan for the weighted funds at R.
B. Stall prioritizes three things: adequately resourcing departments of educators who prepare students for end-of-year tests to raise scores, a newcomer center to support newly arrived families from other countries, and increasing student safety and enhancing school climate. For this, Larson hired additional staff members to help students struggling with academics or behavioral issues.
The high school was rated below average in the 2024 state report card, with end-of-course test scores lower than the district and state averages. School leaders and teachers say that the report card data do not reflect the full potential of their students, though they acknowledge that there's room for improvement, and that additional support from teachers is the key to accelerating student's growth. CCSD considering school funding shake-up Meg Orchard, an instructional coach, said that having multiple teachers in the classroom is helpful for all students, as they can get the individualized support they need to keep pace with others.
She added teachers can achieve more when working in partnership. "Getting together and reviewing progress data allows teachers to intentionally target instruction, as well as sharing ideas on what works and what doesn't," Orchard said. Maggie VanThullenar instructs how to solve math problems with her fellow teacher Alyssa Wimmer in their third grade class at Pinehurst Elementary School, Tuesday, October 29, 2024, in North Charleston.
The district allocated $1.8 million in weighted funding to R.B.
Stall, making it the school receiving the highest amount of these extra dollars. The high school's enrollment is around 1,800 students, with more than 70 percent living in poverty. Roughly half of all students are multilingual.
Maggie VanThullenar leads the class of third grade students in a lesson that starts with a song, Tuesday, October 29, 2024, in North Charleston. At Pinehurst Elementary, the school in South Carolina with the highest percentage rate of multilingual students, principal Paul Pallagi said he is using the weighted funds to support a co-teaching program in partnership with Clemson University in a select number of his classrooms. Pinehurst is receiving $1.
2 million in weighted funding to support its students in poverty and with disabilities, as well as its growing population of multilingual students — about 593 kids in total, 78 percent of the student body. The co-teaching program, which was piloted on the 2023-2024 school year, resulted in exponential growth with students, Pallagi said. Veteran and novice teachers are placed together in a classroom where both can support students and offer customized instruction based on their needs.
Axel Rivera Guevara and Zionna Fields work through multiplication problems in their third grade class with Alyssa Wimmer and Maggie VanThullenar at Pinehurst Elementary, Tuesday, October 29, 2024, in North Charleston. "We have to think outside of the box to help catch them up," Pallagi said. "We have students who are coming to us with no education, some education or who have been out of school for two or three years.
" Pallagi also invested funds to add to his group of language interventionists and multilingual specialists at the school, to support students and families with limited or no English proficiency. The third grade math classroom at Pinehurst was pin-drop quiet on a late October morning. The lights were off, sunlight bled through the blinds and young faces were illuminated by a large touchscreen where teachers Alyssa Wimmer and Maggie VanThullenar taught multiplication.
Students sat on the floor paying close attention to the lesson, using small white boards to practice the math problems. VanThullenar periodically walked across the mat where students sat, helping those who struggled to understand or execute the equations. Once everyone finished their task, teachers and students celebrated, signing and banging their boards to the rhythm of a song about counting by three.
Support for all Anna Dassing, principal at Lucy Beckham High, said the funding model has been impactful at her school. Lucy Beckham is receiving an extra $430,000 to support more than 500 students who fit the model's three funding categories. Lucy Beckham Amy Torcasio (center) helps out her student Sophie Prevost during class Wednesday, November 13, 2024 in Mount Pleasant.
Since the percentage of such students is lower at Lucy Beckham than at other schools and the building is located in an affluent area, the Mount Pleasant high school does not receive Title I funding, Dassing said. However, they still have students who need the resources, so the weighted funding fills a gap, she said. Amy Torcasio, head of the department of special education at Lucy Beckham, said the extra funds allowed the school to have co-teachers in classrooms serving students with disabilities, and to open an extra classroom for students who need testing accommodations.
The school hired an extra staff member to manage the testing site and monitor students who need to leave the general education classroom to take their exams. Torcasio said that this has allowed teachers to spend more uninterrupted time with students in the classroom who need one-on-one instruction. Dassing said the school also hired a staff member to support multilingual learners, a student concern specialist, a school counselor and a full-time social worker to support its pupils in poverty.
Lucy Beckham Amy Torcasio helps students Luke Briggs (center) and Dempsey Mercer during class Wednesday, November 13, 2024 in Mount Pleasant. Principals said the model has not really changed the way they run their schools, but it has allowed them to be more creative in improving student outcomes. "It's giving me the autonomy to do what I feel is best for the kids," Pallagi said.
Dassing said that with the new funding model, the district has gotten away from a "one-size-fits-all" approach. "What's good for Lucy Beckham may not be exactly what Wando High or R.B.
Stall High need," she said. "The district is listening, the board is listening, they are responding to the needs of our schools." CCSD in brief: Teacher pay increase scenarios, CCSD funding model, and more.
