U-46 schools to offer tutoring next year

Hundreds of Elgin Area School District U-46 parents are likely pretty confused.

In recent weeks, letters have been mailed off to the homes of students attending 10 elementary schools that are in "school improvement status" after failing to meet federal No Child Left Behind bench marks for two years in a row.

The letters say that because of the school's poor performance, parents have the option to enroll their child in another, higher performing school in the district.

Only, no such thing is really going to happen in U-46.

Instead, students must stay put at the same 10 schools this year. Those coming from low-income homes will have the option of getting tutoring help in reading, math and science.

What?

Across the state this year, school districts could ask the state for approval to offer reading, math and science tutoring to low-income students instead of school choice.

Illinois State Board of Education spokeswoman Mary Fergus said that fewer than a dozen Illinois districts, one of them U-46, were approved to offer tutoring instead of school choice.

"The belief is we can offer students better services and more help at their home school than by sending them to a different school," district spokesman Tony Sanders said.

According to federal law, however, these districts are not exempted from mailing home letters to parents telling them they have the option of school choice - even if they don't.

The U-46 schools offering the tutoring this year are Channing, Garfield, Highland, Hillcrest, Huff, Lords Park, Sheridan and Washington elementary schools in Elgin, and Laurel Hill and Parkwood elementary schools in Hanover Park. According to the district, approximately 3,800 students are eligible for the tutoring.

Assessment consultant Ed DeYoung told the school board this week that 23 of 40 U-46 elementary schools failed to meet state standards in reading and math this year on the Illinois Standards Achievement Test, up from 19 last year.

Individual schools' scores will be released later this fall.