By VICKIE JAMBON – Staff Reporter

HAHNVILLE – St. Charles Parish is more concerned over funding for summer school than they are over this year’s LEAP scores.

While some scores could use tweaking, the school district is more concerned with finances needed to tutor a new influx of students being offered the opportunity to study for LEAP retesting in July.

“We will have a much larger summer school group than ever before because students with Approaching Basic scores are now invited to attend with students that have Below Basic scores,” said Felecia Gomez, assistant superintendent for elementary schools, curriculum, instruction and assessment.

While the possible turn-out for the summer instruction program is high, the parish’s budget will only increase by $10,000. Gomez along with Rachel Allemand, Executive Director of Curriculum Instruction and Assessment, said the cost of the teaching program is $100,000. The state pays 50 percent of the bill. The supervisors said they need enough money to cover teacher’s pay and transportation cost.

The deadline to submit students’ names for the program is May 20. Once names are tallied, Allemand and Gomez said they will then decide how much staff will be necessary.

Fourth grade English Language Arts Mastery scores increased three percent while Unsatisfactory scores rose two percent. The Unsatisfactory scores were comprised of 27 regular education students and 57 special education students.

Mathematics scores for fourth grade saw a four percentage increase in Unsatisfactory scores. Once again this score reflected regular students as well as special education students. Fourth graders scores for Science and Social Studies fared well.

Eighth grade scores on the Mastery level for English Language Arts had a sharp decline of nine percent. However, the Mathematics and Science scores improved by at least three percent and their Social Studies scores increased by a significant seven percent.

Tenth grade Mathematics scores dropped seven percent but the students showed a two percent improvement in Unsatisfactory scores for English Language Arts and Mathematics.

Eleventh graders displayed marked improvements in Science and Social Studies. In Science, Unsatisfactory scores improved by four percent and in Social Studies they improved by seven percent.

Gomez and Allemand said their sole motivation is to move every student to a higher level. They said they will help teachers find resources that best match curricula realignment.