New London - After its 10th-graders recorded the lowest standardized reading test scores in the state this spring, New London High School brought in a new literacy coach and adopted a renewed mission: Every instructor of every subject - from math to science and social studies to culinary arts - will teach and reinforce language skills.

In just 62 school days, ready or not, every sophomore in the state will take the Connecticut Academic Performance Test, which measures students' abilities to apply what they have learned in school to situations they will face in everyday life.

New London teachers face two daunting tasks: raising this year's reading and mathematics CAPT scores by 5 percent and, by 2015, graduating only those seniors who meet the high school's landmark policy for knowledge of American English.

"The only way you build literacy across a high school is if every teacher is involved in helping to teach literacy," said Superintendent of Schools Nicholas A. Fischer. "What we've got to do is step back and say, 'What do students need to know and be able to do to be successful?' and literacy is obviously a turnkey skill. Without it you're not going to succeed."

At the end of the last school year the Board of Education unanimously approved the policy that requires all students to know and demonstrate their knowledge of the language. The policy, which gives students various ways to demonstrate language skills before age 21, is the first of its kind in Connecticut, according to Fischer. The first class affected is this year's freshmen.

"We can no longer assume that if you get a high school diploma, you have the skills to have a wide range of employment opportunities," Fischer said in a recent interview. "A diploma should recognize that you have the skills to have a range of choices about what you choose to do after graduation. My primary concern is that if we give a student a diploma and they can't read or write, what does the diploma mean?"

He said the factors that led him to propose the new policy included the performance of the city's students over the past decade; the success of students after graduation; and the difference between the number of students who scored "proficient" or less, as opposed to "goal" on statewide tests.

13 languages spoken

On a rainy September afternoon, the 21 students in Kristen Talley's English as a Second Language class worked on a practice CAPT test. Most come from the Dominican Republic and speak Spanish as their first language. Two girls from Haiti speak Creole at home.

Students use French-to-English and Spanish-to-English dictionaries to help translate the words they don't understand in the reading response questions. They must answer the same questions as students in other English classes, although the literary selections are more basic.

CAPT tests cover mathematics, reading, writing and science in nine sessions over nine days. They test for understanding, interpretation, making connections and referring to the text to explain a student's thinking.

One of the Haitian students crossed her arms and furrowed her brow in frustration. She remained stone-faced for a few seconds. Her eyes darted to classmates who were working. She picked up her pencil a second time and scribbled a word or two, only to drop the pencil and place her head on the desk.

Some students appeared to have grasped the practice questions and were busy writing their answers, but others tapped on their desks, rested their heads on their arms or just sat.

New London High is a school in which students speak 13 languages and two of every 10 primarily speak something other than English. Achieving the literacy goal by 2015 is "ambitious, but necessary," according to Maureen Ruby, the high school's literacy coach.

Last year, only 37.4 percent of New London's 10th-graders reached the "proficient" level and only 8.9 percent reached "goal" in the reading achievement tests. New London's scores were much lower than across the state, where 81.9 of 10th-graders tested at or above "proficient" and 44.8 percent tested at or above "goal."

Across the state, scores were significantly lower among students whose primary language is not English; whose family income is low; or who have special needs. The difference between the majority and those groups is often called "the achievement gap."

"Everybody needs to understand what's at stake. Students need to understand what's being asked of them and parents need to understand what we're asking of their children," Ruby said. "I think that (requiring) everyone being proficient in literacy is lofty, but it's a minimal goal. Because we have such a gap of where kids are and where they need to be, it's a lofty goal, but an appropriate one."

She said educators have to find ways to get parents to understand what the school is trying to do and to get their child to believe that his or her job is to be a student.

"We need parents to understand that literacy is their child's ticket out of whatever situation they're in at home," Ruby said. "But for them to believe that, and for their child to believe that, we have to deliver."

Teaching for the CAPT

Teachers of this year's ninth-graders have more than a year to prepare their classes for the Spring 2013 CAPT tests, but they are working with a group in which less than half achieved goal in reading last year on the Connecticut Mastery Test, which is given to students in third through eighth grades.

English teachers Nancy Rodgers and Bridget Joyce met earlier this month with Ruby and Principal William "Tommy" Thompson to discuss the ninth-graders' performance after eight weeks.

They said about 65 percent of their students were "proficient" on the first of the test's four questions by the first week in November.

"Proficient" is the standard measuring whether school systems are making adequate progress in accordance with the federal No Child Left Behind law. "Goal" is a higher standard set by the state of Connecticut.

Both teachers said their greatest accomplishment has been helping freshmen understand time restraints. Each CAPT reading section is administered in two 65-minute sessions.

"Lots of things in life are timed. You only have so many minutes to do what you have to do, not because it's the test but because it's reality," Rodgers said.

During practice she uses online-stopwatch.com to project a 10-minute timer on the board.

Joyce said her students understand that to graduate they will need to meet goal - a higher standard than proficient. Students were at first "freaking out," she said, but have settled in and are making progress.

New London District Literacy Supervisor Grace Ann Conti said the way to get students to buy in is by "talking honestly about literacy."

"You tell a student, 'You demonstrate to us what you know and what you need to learn and we'll help you with what you need to learn,'" Conti said. "We set goals with the kids as to where they want to be and we treat them like adults. Anybody learning wants to have a goal. If you don't have a goal, what are you striving for?"

Thompson said he believes this year's sophomores are on track to meet or exceed the school's 5 percent CAPT improvement goal next spring.

"We are focused on critical thinking skills that cross disciplines and that will serve students beyond the CAPT," Thompson wrote. "This focus is .. game changing and life altering for students that leave school able to do these things. ... Our intense focus on college knowledge and career skills that parallel those skills will pay dividends for our kids."

In Connecticut, it is common to have a literacy coach at the elementary schools, less so in middle schools and far less so in high schools, according to Conti.

"The role of a literacy coach is to teach teachers how to help kids understand the content they are reading and to support them and give them strategies to do that," she said. "Literacy coaches give direct support to teachers and best practices for teaching literacy. They are the person in the building instrumental to changing literacy practices."

During the school day, Ruby visits classrooms. She notes whether the teaching strategies she's discussed with a specific teacher are working and what the teacher could do to improve instruction.

One fall morning, five students in the culinary arts class were preparing to make French crepes with fresh strawberry syrup. Only one had made crepes before and was familiar with the technique of pouring just enough batter into the sizzling pan to form a paper-thin pancake.

While whisking and cooking and, later, eating, students needed to take note of what they were doing because their teacher, Erik Becker, would require them to write a food review.

"He teaches the kids words that have to do with what he's teaching," Ruby said. "They do the process and use the language they're reading in the recipe they're working from so they ensure a deeper connection and take ownership of the words they've seen, heard and used.

"After they're done cooking, you want to provide an opportunity for kids to take their ideas, because now they have experience, and be able to organize them in their heads and then use that language in what they write."

Ruby has teachers use "word walls" as visual aids highlighting key words from current lessons.

"The way of thinking about literacy in 2011 is that all teachers are literacy teachers, because literacy is critical to all content," Ruby said. "So, how do you take a science teacher who knows science content and suddenly say, 'Oh, by the way, now you're responsible for literacy instruction'? Or a math teacher, or a social studies teacher or an art teacher, even an English teacher? You're expecting people to do this job yet they've never been given the tools to get the job done."

What’s at stake

If the high school does not meet its goal for raising CAPT scores by 5 percent, it could receive more pressure from the state department of education and federal government.

“They look very carefully at what the school has been doing to change the way students are being taught, they put pressure on the superintendent, principal and the teachers and they say you just can’t keep doing the same old, same old,” Fischer said Friday.

“The school is receiving some of that pressure now and we’ve been in a three-year process to change what’s happening at the school, including changing the teacher evaluation process and training the principals and teachers on how to improve literacy across the curriculum.”

Last May, the state Department of Education awarded New London a School Improvement Grant of $800,000 a year for three years.

According to the state, the goal of the SIG funds is to fund “chronically low-achieving” schools to “dramatically transform school culture and increase student outcomes.”

The high school must show that it is implementing the improvement plan it submitted as part of the grant application. Those include reaching three-year achievement goals in reading and math on the CMT or CAPT for all students or subgroups, working with a state education department technical team assigned to the school and being monitored monthly.

“The SIG grant helps us do what the state and federal government expects us to do. We would be expected to do these things whether we got the grant or not but the grant gives us additional money to do them,” Fischer said.

j.hanckel@theday.com