MSA Night!

By all accounts, the February 24th MSA Night event at Piney Branch Elementary School was a big success! MSA stands for the Maryland State Assessment—the state standardized test taken by 3rd through 8th graders. MSA Night provided an opportunity for parents and children to learn more about the test and gain tips for improving student achievement.

The large turnout (more than 100 parents and children!) showed that there was a high level of interest in the topic. The parent-child event brought out diverse families, with representation from just about every demographic group at the school.

The MSA Night event was a project developed and implemented by members of the Piney Branch Action Team. The MSA event embodied many of the Multicultural Criteria developed by the Team. It was an event that:
 Created trust and relationship building opportunities across cultures.
 Fostered a warm and welcoming multicultural drop-in environment.
 Encouraged passionate teaching, learning and parenting to support all cultures.

Action Team members thought long and hard about ways to make the event inviting and interesting to the multicultural school community. Amharic and Spanish translation were provided and handouts were offered in those languages as well. Childcare and dinner were provided. The test prep book used during the event was trimmed down to make it more accessible. An MSA Night information table was staffed by Action Team members during the previous night’s Black History Month event. Nine of the families engaged at that event came out the next night to the MSA event!

Principal Bertram Generlette began the evening with an overview of the MSA that included information about how the test is administered, what is covered, and statistics on Piney Branch’s performance. Also included in the overview was a discussion of the achievement gap and how it plays out related to the MSA.

One of the highlights of the evening was a segment called “Taste of the Test.” Ken Allen, a 5th grade science teacher and Action Team member, led the interactive session that had parents and kids working together to answer sample test questions. Ken had this to say about the segment:

“After I handed out the tests and explained what I wanted them to do, everyone got to work. Ten or fifteen minutes later I looked out over the parents and children and saw how hard they were all working. I commented to someone that this was the ‘perfect class’: a low murmur of conversation exactly on task. The conversation was going both ways: children explaining some things to their parents and parents encouraging and challenging their children. Perfect!”

The evening ended on a fun note as ESOL teacher Rachna Rikhye (also an Action Team member) raffled off prizes that parents could use at home to help children learn math skills. Kids enjoyed coming up front to receive clocks, measuring cups, tape measures, and cake pans. Action Team members hope that this event represents the first of what will become an annual school gathering.

Check out this video of what PBES parent Tina McGuire and Principal Generlette had to say about the event.

The Snow Can't Stop Our Momentum!

Despite having to cancel two consecutive meetings because of snow, Action Team members were able to connect today to continue planning for the next round of action projects. Just how did we do that? Via conference call. Hurrah for technology!

Even though our last meeting was a distant three weeks ago on January 20th, Team members were able to quickly pick up where we'd left off. We'd already determined that our next round of projects would have an MSA (Maryland State Assessment) focus. Today we reached consensus on holding at least three MSA Night events--one at the school and two in the community (most likely at apartment complexes close to the school). Bertram suggested that February 24th would be a good date for the school event.


Why an MSA focus? Well, the Action Team's larger concentration is on student achievement and, as Jane put it, the MSA can be a big hurdle to that achievement. Vineda offered that the MSA is an interesting case study for our group's ongoing conversations about the achievement gap. Tebabu said that his assessment is that, "for immigrant parents the MSA is totally foreign to them." Lora offered that the MSA can be a mystery for many parents. One big goal of the MSA action projects is increasing parental awareness and empowerment.

Our next Action Team meeting is on Wednesday, February 17th. Prior to that meeting, Ray and Tebabu will develop action research questions that Team members can take out into the community to gather MSA feedback. Team members will be dividing into smaller groups to plan each of the MSA Night events. Undoubtedly the community feedback will be helpful to that planning.

There is much to be done in a very short period of time, but as the saying goes, "Many hands make light work."