When schools went virtual in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, educators at Birmingham City Schools in Birmingham, AL, were able to get a glimpse, via Zoom, into the homes of their students. Unfortunately, what they saw was that many of their students were struggling.
“I think the pandemic really opened our eyes to a lot of things that were just under the surface,” said Superintendent Dr. Mark Sullivan. “People felt real comfortable in their lives not seeing what was right in front of them. And the pandemic pulled that veneer away.”
What they discovered was that many students had to work or take on the role of parenting for their siblings rather than focus on their virtual lessons. Without access to free lunches, some were more worried about where their next meal would come from rather than turning in homework on time.
At the end of 2021, math proficiency scores in the district hovered around 4 percent, reflecting the challenges students went through the year prior.
Dr. Sullivan and his leadership team were determined to turn those scores around by taking the lessons they learned during COVID as an opportunity to rethink the way they taught their students in the district. He challenged his team to implement a new plan for increasing student achievement, which included Savvas Learning Company’s enVision Mathematics as their new district-wide math curriculum, a research-based teaching framework, robust professional development, and expanded learning time for students. And it’s paying off.
At the end of the 2023 school year, the district’s overall math proficiency scores for grades 3-12 nearly tripled since 2021, outperforming where it was before the pandemic. In grade 3 alone, scores skyrocketed from 4 percent at the end of 2021 to 19 percent at the end of 2023.
“Many districts saw a dip in their math data. We saw an increase,” said Dr. Pamela Williams, the district’s director of curriculum and instruction. “A couple of percentage points is huge when you've been always going further and further back. So our trajectory is headed in the correct direction.”
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