The impact of the new middle school math placement criteria will take center stage at today's Wake County school board economically disadvantaged student performance task force meeting.

The task force will hear a report on how many middle school students are in advanced math classes this school year based on last week's 20th-day enrollment. The new guidelines, which use EVAAS, are expected to result in an increase in enrollment, especially among black and Hispanic students.

School board member John Tedesco, chairman of the task force, had asked for the totals to see how much the new guidelines are being used. The data is expected to show how many students identified as being ready by EVAAS are in those advanced classes and how many are not.

UPDATE

Click here for today's meeting agenda.

Why were a majority of qualified black and Hispanic students not placed in advanced math classes in Wake County middle schools for years?

As noted in today's article, the new EVAAS-based selection criteria is expected to sharply increase placement in middle schools this school year. As the SAS EVAAS report showed, Algebra-ready black and Hispanic students were the least likely to have gotten placed before.

Questions abut institutionalized racism and low expectations have been tossed out as possible reasons for the low placement rates.

CORRECTED POST TO SAY BARBARA WALTERS

Wake County school board member John Tedesco wants the school district to do its own teacher effectiveness report following the much-discussed study done recently in Los Angeles.

As noted in today's Triangle Politics column, Tedesco is hailing the findings in the study of Los Angeles Unified School District teachers that was reported Sunday in the Los Angeles Times. The newspaper's analysis of the data is challenging some popular conceptions about teacher effectiveness.

"It's everything we're saying," Tedesco said "We have to get the best teachers in front of the kids. The most highly certified teachers are not necessarily the most effective teachers. We need to get the right teachers in front of the kids instead of shuffling kids around."

A Sunday Los Angeles Times article is challenging some popular conceptions about which teachers are effective and where they work.

The newspaper analyzed student records in the Los Angeles Unified School System to perform a value-added analysis of teacher effectiveness. The newspaper's plan to post online a database of the results of 6,000 elementary school teachers has produced an uproar, including a mass boycott from the teacher's union.

Findings included:

Here's a recap of the rest of today's Wake County school board work session.

The board asked interim Superintendent Donna Hargens to come with a recommendation next week on whether to restore any of the nine parent counselor positions cut from Project Enlightenment. No specific number was set but the board is looking at three to five positions.

The board also asked Hargens to come back with a recommendation on whether any of more than a dozen senior administrative positions identified by the board can be cut.

I'll go into more detail later, but here's a quick update on Wake County's efforts to increase participation in advanced math classes in middle school.

Ken Branch, senior director for middle school programs, said there's been an increase in seventh-graders taking Pre-Algebra and eighth-graders taking Algebra I since this set of revised middle school math placement criteria was implemented in the spring. The new criteria came after last year's SAS EVAAS report indicated many Algebra I ready kids in Wake, particularly minorities, weren't being placed.

But several questions were asked at Thursday's economically disadvantaged student performance task force meeting about why teachers are still not letting some students into these advanced courses.

We've got the Enloe High naming controversy, the relocation of Central Office to Cary and the performance of low-income students on the various Wake County school board agendas today.

The agenda for the policy committee meeting that begins at 10 a.m. includes a discussion on whether to change the policy that prevents naming or renaming schools after people. The policy would need to be changed in case the board renames Enloe High School.

Another potentially interesting discussion topic is a review of the policy on distribution of publications by non-students.

UPDATE

The full board voted today to ask the state Local Government Commission for permission to relocate Central Office to Cary. School staff said the LGC will discuss Wake's plan on July 6.

The Wake County school board could have another memorable Tuesday on tap.

The most public attention will be focused on the closed-session personnel meeting at 7:30 p.m. School board members hope to finally answer the question of whether Superintendent Del Burns will stay on through his announced June 30 resignation date.

The Wake County school board's student achievement committee will also not be meeting this month.

School board member Deborah Prickett, the new chairwoman of the student achievement committee, wants the group to meet in the early evening hours. Previously, it has met from 11 a.m to 1 p.m. on the second and fourth Tuesdays of the month.

Prickett is looking at a 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. time slot to reduce time conflicts with her day job as character education consultant for the state Department of Public Instruction.

You can probably add Ann Denlinger, president of the Wake Education Partnership, to the list of people who will be invited to speak at a meeting of the county commissioners.

The request is coming from Commissioner Joe Bryan, who was impressed by a presentation Denlinger made at a Tuesday forum sponsored by the Knightdale 100, a new grassroots group that wants to improve education in Eastern Wake.

Denlinger noted how Knightdale High had 11 Advanced Placement courses while Enloe High had 28 of them. Denlinger told the crowd about the need to offer more AP classes.