With Superintendent June Atkinson’s elementary school reading campaign fresh out of Raleigh, local school district principals don’t know how much of Give Five — Read Five can be implemented because the school year is approaching its close.
The program, which launched Tuesday, is designed for students to retain literacy skills through the school-free summer. The core of the campaign is businesses, community and parent donations to local school libraries.
Though application in Lenoir County Schools is in its preliminary stage at this point, the two Lenoir County elementary schools who had the district’s lowest reading scores last year — hovering in the 40 percent region — may want to get a piece of Give Five.
Southeast Elementary School averaged 44.2 percent in reading scores, compared to a 65.2 percent in the district and a 71.2 percent mark for the state, according to NCSchoolsReportCard.com. Northeast had the lowest reading scores last year with 41.4 percent.
But Northeast Media Specialist Melanie McCoy said student have reached expected growth in reading for the current school year.
“Our reading scores are really good,” McCoy said. “We’re really proud of the growth the kids are showing. We can’t say enough about it.”
Principal Kecia Dunn said Northeast reading scores shouldn’t be too far behind the district’s level due to an accelerated reader program.
Students, at their leisure, can read books and take quizzes through the program.
“It’s just amazing how many quizzes we’re taking this year,” Dunn said. “Our children are reading more, they’re taking more accelerated reader quizzes and passing at an 84 to 85 percent rate.”
She said first semester benchmark scores indicate the growth while a number of different factors can be responsible for the low scores in the first place.
“I don’t know if I can say one particular reason as to why the reading scores were low,” Dunn said. “Many times it comes from the amount of vocabulary that a child has developed when they enter kindergarten. Research says that by the time a child enters kindergarten, they need to know between 6,000-10,000 words.”
Some children who come to Northeast have not been exposed to language and vocabulary, so the teachers play catch-up, Dunn said.
Because the end of the school year is near and the first 300-book donation has already been made, Give Five — Read Five will likely not be implemented right away in Lenoir County.
“(LCS) has discusses it at length,” said Ellen Benton, local executive director of curriculum instruction. “It is a huge undertaking at this time of year to think that we could collect five books per student and send them home during the summer. It would take a lot of man power…”
When Give Five — Read Five starts locally, the schools will look to PTA, businesses and churches for donations.
“We thought the program was great and it’s a very worthy cause,” Benton said, “but we felt like it needed a whole year’s implementation.”
Jessika Morgan can be reached at 252-559-1078 or at jessika.morgan@kinston.com. Follow her on Twitter @JessikaMorgan
Elementary School Reading Scores 2011-12
State average: 71.2 percent
LenoirCounty(District Average: 65.2 percent)
Banks Elementary — 76.9
Contentnea-Savannah — 66.2, 84.5, 74.7
La Grange Elementary — 64.3
Moss Hill Elementary — 77.4
Northeast Elementary — 41.4
Northwest Elementary — 64.4
Pink Hill Elementary — 64.8
Southeast Elementary — 44.2
Southwood Elementary — 64.7
GreeneCounty(District Average: 52.1 percent)
Snow Hill Primary, no information available
West Greene Elementary — 52.1
JonesCounty(District Average: 69 percent)
Maysville Elementary — 75.7
Pollocksville — 77.1
Trenton Elementary — 65.4