Education Department boosts resources as student assessments dip

Since the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the education system more than two years ago, Janet Lee has seen an increase in demand from parents looking to get their children extra help with math and reading skills.

The instructor at Kumon Math and Reading Centre of Halifax said the disruption to classroom teaching has meant certain key skills could use some extra attention.

"Even before COVID came there was real concern about both those two subjects, but now more so with COVID given how it's affected the subsequent years," she said.

That experience is reflected in the most recent provincial assessment results for math and literacy in the 2021-22 school year, which the Nova Scotia Education Department released on Tuesday.

In general, the results for students in Grades 3, 6, 8 and 10 show fewer students meeting expectations for math, reading and writing at their respective levels than the number of studentshitting those benchmarks in assessments conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nova Scotia Teachers Union president Ryan Lutes said he's not surprised by the results.

Lutes said teachers have long reported their struggles, and those of their students,and the situation was exacerbated by COVID-19which saw long stretches of time where students were not inschools,learning online instead.

• View all assessment results for 2021-22

"It's really just confirming what teachers, you know, feel all the time," Lutes said in an interview.

"Their kids have a lot of needs that they're working really hard to support, but they just can't do it without a little bit more help."

Education Minister BeckyDruhan said she and officials in her department are not waiting to provide the system with more help.

This school year has includedthe introduction of a new literacy framework to help with phonics, an enhanced focus on reading and writing, computer software programs that can help with math and literacy, and more access to a variety of reading materials.

"When we've observed or when we've anticipated issues, we've responded," Druhan said in an interview.

"[We] haven't waited for assessment results or any other results. And that's something we'll continue to do."

Druhan said regional centres for education are using the assessment information to inform how they help improve student performance.

The executive director of the Tri-County Regional Centre for Education said those efforts are already paying off this school year.

Tri-County traditionally lags behind the other regions in student assessment performance and that is again the case for the 2021-22 numbers. But Jared Purdy said a commitment to "short-cycle data analysis" since September has already shown "tremendous growth" in student outcomes.

The region has done a good job of tracking data in the past but not at using it to create plans for improvement, said Purdy. This year, principals are paired with coordinators to monitor reading levels and other skills every six weeks.

Regional efforts to improve student outcomes

That means when groups or specific students need extra help, they are quickly identified.

"We've gone from looking at percentages and pie charts to looking at numbers, and now we're looking at names," said Purdy.

The approach in Tri-County is part of a new three-year planaimed at the region reaching agoalof meeting or exceeding the provincial average for student assessment benchmarks. Purdy said he's encouraged by the early results.

Lutes said the teachers union would like to see more support from the Education Department in the form of more staffwhich would ease demands on teachers and create more opportunities to break students into smaller groups for more focused assistance.

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