Quick tests on way in Dist. 300

If you hear there's a SWAT team at your neighborhood elementary school, don't worry -- your kids are safe.

Community Unit District 300's so-called "SWAT Team" will soon bring a new method of testing to elementary schools across the district.

The 50-person team, made up of district teachers, school psychologists and other support staff, fans out across the district's elementary schools three times a year to administer one- to three-minute tests to every kid from kindergarten to second grade.

The SWAT Team and the testing are part of a federally mandated program called Response to Intervention.

This is the first year of the program in District 300, and all districts in the state have until the 2010-11 school year to begin implementing the program.

Response to Intervention is novel in a couple ways. First, it doesn't target a particular group of students, such as high or low performers or a certain ethnic group.

Instead, the program tests all students to measure their ability to grasp basic concepts at their grade level.

And unlike other state and federally mandated testing that measures a school's overall progress, Response to Intervention identifies individual students and develops interventions to bring those students up to grade level.

District 300 uses AIMSweb, a Web-based program that assesses students in English or Spanish. The district is testing only reading this year but will expand to other subjects in the future.

"If a child does well on the AIMSweb probes, there's a very good correlation that they're going to be doing well on reading in the classroom," said Leslie Williams, the district's Response to Intervention facilitator.

This year, 10 elementary schools in District 300 are serving as pilot schools for the program. Gilberts Elementary School, one of two new elementary schools that opened this year, is among the pilot sites.

"We're in pretty good shape," Gilberts Principal Jeff King said. "We're looking forward to further staff development and implementing K through 5 next year."

The district plans to introduce the program at all elementary schools next year, then roll it out at the middle and high schools over the following two years.

Williams said it's still early to measure progress but that Response to Intervention schools are already getting attention across the district.

"The 16 buildings that have no part in this are starting to say, 'Why not us?' " she said.