BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Telegraph Staff Writer
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS— Clay County School board members denied a request by Superintendent David Broskie to renew a contract for interactive reading software during the board’s Aug. 2 meeting.
Board member Michele Hanson, who represents the Lake Region, led the criticism of Acheive3000 Literacy, published by McGraw Hill.
The former English teacher said the digital resource, on which students read articles and then answer questions about the article’s content, is unpopular with teachers.
She added that other teachers misuse the resource, using it as a standalone assignment without guidance and instruction from the teacher.
During the board meeting, Hanson referenced a July 25 workshop in which she first criticized the program.
“During the workshop, I gave 20 valid reasons why Achieve3000 does not benefit our students, and it comes with a price tag of $618,000,” she said. “My main concern with Achieve is the complete lack of protocols and procedures that result in negative impacts on students both emotionally and academically.”
Hanson then described how she integrated Achieve3000 into her classroom instruction when she taught English, emphasizing that she never used it as a standalone assignment.
She said students with different ability levels and distinctive points of view might answer a question differently than the program prescribes.
“If you have only one idea of how to answer a question,” she said, “you can guess what happens to most of the students when they do Achieve3000. They consistently receive low scores and fail many times. Teachers add this to the grade book. There’s no reteaching. Oftentimes, it’s left just the way it is. Students cannot know what they have not been taught.”
Hanson also criticized Broskie for what she described as his attempts to redirect and deflect the board anytime members talk about items outside of the administration’s direction.
“When Mr. Broskie called me on the phone yesterday and followed up by a letter to the board, it appeared it was an attempt to gaslight the board into one direction of thought,” she said.
Board members Erin Skipper, Beth Clark and Ashley Gillhousen joined Hanson in voting down the contract renewal.
Board member and retired elementary school teacher Mary Bolla voted for the expenditure. She acknowledged that Acheive3000 might have been used as a “babysitting tool” by some teachers and added that she did not use the resource in her classroom.
“Are there going to be a few teachers that probably misuse it?” she said. “I think that’s true of every curriculum. We’ve got 3,000 teachers. You hope that everybody teaches it with as much integrity as they possibly can, but you know that sometimes people may not go in that direction.”
In supporting the measure, Bolla said she agreed with Broskie, who wrote in his letter to school board members that the resource is intended to supplement instruction and not be used as a standalone assignment.
She also said the resource could uncover reading deficiencies in students and assist students in teaching one another through collaboration.
