New Haven’s school board unanimously approved locking in another year of online math programming amid concern over how long students spend on screens all day. The unanimous vote to OK a $656,299 purchase order took place at Monday night’s Board of Education meeting. Just before the vote, teachers union President Leslie Blatteau called for the district to assess how long New Haven’s PreK-12 students spend on screens in the classrooms. Despite the approval, district leaders acknowledged the value in evaluating technology use in classrooms. The purchase order with Curriculum Associates LLC is to provide the district with a math curriculum that incorporates in-person classroom teaching, textbooks, and the personalized online math program i-Ready for grades PreK-8. New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) has been using i-Ready as its core math curriculum resource platform for six years. Blatteau spoke on the agreement not just because of its cost but also because of recent news that California parents were suing Curriculum Associates, the maker of the i-Ready learning platform, for allegedly collecting and sharing student data. She also noted that the contract, costing more than a half million dollars, comes at a time when the district is operating with a “tight budget.” “Yes, of course we have to have curriculum to guide our teaching and learning,” she said. Still, Blatteau questioned the increase of screen time in daily school teaching. While technology was encouraged and utilized during the Covid pandemic, Blatteau recalled, districts have moved past that era and, despite returning to “brick and mortar” schooling, are “oftentimes engaging in online learning in person.” She raised concern with her fellow educators that school districts are “increasingly moving into a world where there is more and more online learning happening in school.” (Read a recently retired special education teacher’s concerns around the role online programming played in her students’ learning here.) As a result of these concerns, Blatteau said she talked Monday before the meeting with Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment Keisha Redd-Hannans and teachers union vice president Jenny Graves. They discussed ideas of possibly assessing and taking inventory of how much time students are spending on screens during the school day at all grade levels throughout the district. Blatteau said the union would be willing to work together to assess the implications of those classroom findings revealing how much time children are spending on screens. “When you look at individual programs, it’s maybe ten minutes a day of an individual program, but there is more than just i-Ready math,” Blatteau said before listing off other computer programs like Lexia and Read180, which are apart of the “menu of online learning programs that our taxpayers pay for that have our children engaging in work online.” Blatteau also said that two months ago, news came out that the Curriculum Associates is facing a lawsuit from parents in California alleging that the company collected student data and shared it with third parties without proper consent from parents. Blatteau told the school board that this recent news is worthwhile to include in the discussion, as the district considers engaging in the costly contract. After Blatteau’s remarks on Monday, the board voted 7-0 to approve the agreement. “To what extent are we jeopardizing our students’ and families’ data privacy by entering into these contracts, and to what extent are we honoring our commitment to developmentally appropriate practices when we make decisions around teaching and learning?” she asked. Blatteau clarified that the union’s call for assessing technology use is not one to push away all technology from schools. She said, however, it is a realistic request because the district is responsible for its students development and education, meaning assessing daily technology use during the school day is “a call for us to remember that our students are on screens for much of their time outside of school.” “While I might have been a Luddite when I was 19, I am no longer a Luddite,” she added. “This is not a Luddite call for no technology.” Blatteau also applauded the city and school district during her remarks for its initiative to provide free and low-cost after-school programming five days a week this year. She described the initiative as a real strategy to meet student and family needs. She then connected it back to her screen time concerns, stating, “We know for every kid we don’t see outside playing in a playground, they’re most likely inside on a screen. So that brings us back to, if we have precious hours inside of school, let’s make every effort to minimize time on screens.” Blatteau concluded her remarks by presenting board members with a recently established ten-point improvement plan made by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). The plan calls for many things, including no screens (including online assessments) for students in pre-K through second grade, “unless there is a compelling reason, such as to most effectively support a student with special needs.” 10-pointDownload She invited parents and families to lean in to asking their building principal and leadership teams this school year how many minutes per day their students are spending on computers and to report back what they learn at a board meeting. During an Aug 17. Finance and Operations (FO) Committee meeting, Board of Ed members Andrea Downer and Matt Wilcox discussed concerns related to the efficacy of the Curriculum Associates contract. Click here to watch the conversation, which starts at the 1:11:09 mark and includes Downer pushing for the district to consider a new math curriculum in the future to see more math proficiency growth throughout the district. District math supervisor Monica Joyner, in return, spoke highly of the impact the program has on students. After Blatteau’s remarks on Monday, the board voted 7-0 to approve the agreement. But before the school board voted to approved the Curriculum Associates agreement, Mayor Justin Elicker, who serves on the board, asked Supt. Madeline Negrón if she could respond to concerns Blatteau raised related to i-Ready’s owner. Negrón responded that she is aware of the alleged data breach issues related to the i-Ready program and said that she personally reached out to a company representative “who assured us that, that did not include any of the work that has been happening in Connecticut.” She also said that she agrees the district should “continue to look at screen time for children” and remain aware of the documented effects screen time can have. She said implementing a plan to assess the district’s usage in classrooms is a great idea, because “at the end of the day, we want to make sure that we are positioning our students for great things and not putting them in harm’s way.” Elicker responded that he too believes it would be valuable for the school community to explore a balance between online learning and in-person learning by first continuing conversations about what usage currently looks like. “My kids use i-Ready and they enjoy it, and I think they get something out of it,” he said, “but it’s worth it to have the conversation.” Board member Edward Joyner briefly responded during Monday’s meeting, stating, “Just simply saying ‘screen time’ is problematic. If you watch a documentary on drill rap, that’s very different from watching a documentary on the life of John Lewis or Harriet Tubman.” Correction Aug. 27, 12:08 p.m.: A previous version of this article stated that the Board of Education’s contract with Curriculum Associates LLC costs $656,299 for a year of online math programming. In fact, while online math programming is a component of Curriculum Associates LLC’s digital program, i-Ready, the curriculum also includes in-person teaching and textbooks. The post Schools OK $656k Math Curriculum appeared first on New Haven Independent. ...read more read less