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There’s a new school on the block
New elementary school opening in David Douglas School District
DAWN WIDLER
THE MID-COUNTY MEMO
Arthur Academy, a new charter elementary school in the David Douglas School District will be opening soon and is now accepting applications for next fall. The charter application has been accepted and the final contract between Arthur Academy and the David Douglas School District is scheduled to be signed on Thursday, June 13.
According to the Oregon State Charter School law, one of the goals of charter schools is to “provide opportunities in small learning environments for flexibility and innovation, which may be applied, if proven effective, to other public schools.”
In our schools today, far too many children are still not meeting basic levels of achievement and far too few children are exceeding basic levels. Improvement of these levels will reduce the cost of expensive remedial programs, increasing resources available for general educational goals.
Charter schools are a recent creation of the State Legislature, implemented in order to help discover a way to alleviate these problems by discovering successful instructional methods. Charter schools are supported by public funds, and are thus open to any child in the school district at no charge. However, they are privately operated through a charter with the local school district, providing an alternative to public schools.
A charter school must have a clear design plan that includes curriculum, teaching methods, and expectations for students. Each charter school also has a board of directors made up of parents and community members.
Arthur Academy is committed to maintaining a school environment that is safe, caring and orderly. School developer/administrator Charles Arthur says that Arthur Academy is “dedicated to providing excellent programs and skillful teaching in an environment of safety, individual attention, understanding and caring”.
Arthur Academy’s programs are helpful to below average, average and gifted students because they enable every student to learn to the best of their ability. One of the unique aspects of any charter school is the desire to inform parents of the teaching approach and curriculum being used. Charter schools such as Arthur Academy provide more parent choice.
Arthur Academy provides an alternative to public school, utilizing a proven teaching method. The Direct Instruction model of teaching has been exhaustively tested and refined for the past three decades at the University of Oregon.
Arthur Academy uses the nationally recognized, unique, highly specialized, and very effective curriculum programs of Direct Instruction, Oregon Model, and the Core Knowledge programs of E.D. Hirsch based on his books on Cultural Literacy. Hundreds of charter schools across the county are utilizing these methods, and the numbers increase every year.
Pioneered by Drs. Siegfried Engelmann and Carl Bereiter during the 1960’s, Direct Instruction (DI) was initially used to raise the academic success level of inner-city children. It has been proven highly effective for all children including challenged, average, and gifted learners, because it allows each child to learn at the level of their capability, and helps children to retain and apply what they have learned. Numerous studies have confirmed this, including Project Follow Through (PFT). PFT, the largest educational study ever, included 79,000 children in 180 communities at a cost of over $600 million. PFT examined multiple programs and educational philosophies to discover the most effective way to improve education for children in grades K-3. DI was matched against several other programs, including those currently used in public schools. Direct Instruction proved to be the most effective program. In addition, DI dramatically improved cognitive skills, and showed improvement in self-esteem scores as a result of their improved performance. DI is consistently more successful and less costly than the popular programs now being taught to aspiring teachers in university education departments. Follow-up studies indicated that students taught with DI in elementary school were one year ahead of non-DI students in reading and seven months ahead in math by the end of 9th grade. Also, DI students showed higher rates for staying in school, timely high school graduation, and acceptance into college.
New elementary school opening in David Douglas School District
DAWN WIDLER
THE MID-COUNTY MEMO
 |
| Schematic of Arthur Academy (click image for larger view) |
According to the Oregon State Charter School law, one of the goals of charter schools is to “provide opportunities in small learning environments for flexibility and innovation, which may be applied, if proven effective, to other public schools.”
In our schools today, far too many children are still not meeting basic levels of achievement and far too few children are exceeding basic levels. Improvement of these levels will reduce the cost of expensive remedial programs, increasing resources available for general educational goals.
Charter schools are a recent creation of the State Legislature, implemented in order to help discover a way to alleviate these problems by discovering successful instructional methods. Charter schools are supported by public funds, and are thus open to any child in the school district at no charge. However, they are privately operated through a charter with the local school district, providing an alternative to public schools.
A charter school must have a clear design plan that includes curriculum, teaching methods, and expectations for students. Each charter school also has a board of directors made up of parents and community members.
Arthur Academy is committed to maintaining a school environment that is safe, caring and orderly. School developer/administrator Charles Arthur says that Arthur Academy is “dedicated to providing excellent programs and skillful teaching in an environment of safety, individual attention, understanding and caring”.
Arthur Academy’s programs are helpful to below average, average and gifted students because they enable every student to learn to the best of their ability. One of the unique aspects of any charter school is the desire to inform parents of the teaching approach and curriculum being used. Charter schools such as Arthur Academy provide more parent choice.
Arthur Academy provides an alternative to public school, utilizing a proven teaching method. The Direct Instruction model of teaching has been exhaustively tested and refined for the past three decades at the University of Oregon.
Arthur Academy uses the nationally recognized, unique, highly specialized, and very effective curriculum programs of Direct Instruction, Oregon Model, and the Core Knowledge programs of E.D. Hirsch based on his books on Cultural Literacy. Hundreds of charter schools across the county are utilizing these methods, and the numbers increase every year.
Pioneered by Drs. Siegfried Engelmann and Carl Bereiter during the 1960’s, Direct Instruction (DI) was initially used to raise the academic success level of inner-city children. It has been proven highly effective for all children including challenged, average, and gifted learners, because it allows each child to learn at the level of their capability, and helps children to retain and apply what they have learned. Numerous studies have confirmed this, including Project Follow Through (PFT). PFT, the largest educational study ever, included 79,000 children in 180 communities at a cost of over $600 million. PFT examined multiple programs and educational philosophies to discover the most effective way to improve education for children in grades K-3. DI was matched against several other programs, including those currently used in public schools. Direct Instruction proved to be the most effective program. In addition, DI dramatically improved cognitive skills, and showed improvement in self-esteem scores as a result of their improved performance. DI is consistently more successful and less costly than the popular programs now being taught to aspiring teachers in university education departments. Follow-up studies indicated that students taught with DI in elementary school were one year ahead of non-DI students in reading and seven months ahead in math by the end of 9th grade. Also, DI students showed higher rates for staying in school, timely high school graduation, and acceptance into college.
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