By Avice Meehan

Botelle Elementary School has been named a school of distinction for the 2023-24 academic year for showing great improvement across a range of standards measured by Connecticut’s Department of Education (DOE).

Principal Lauren Valentino shared the news at the Nov. 12 meeting of the Board of Education and, in a lighthearted moment, gave board members gold stars for supporting the school’s performance. Botelle received an accountability score of 72.88. The metric looks at growth and academic achievement for all students, including those identified as high need.

“We saw a major rebound this year. It shows that the things we are doing are paying off. Our kids are growing and making good progress,” said Valentino. She presented a detailed overview of student performance at the meeting, noting that student growth “increased dramatically” on the Smarter Balanced Assessment for math and English language arts. 

Valentino noted that schoolwide performance remained consistent from year to year even as the high needs population increased. Roughly 63 percent of all Botelle students are identified as high need for a variety of reasons, including socioeconomic need and learning disabilities. Top-level scores on the Smarter Balance assessment for students in Grades 3-6 were reported in the November issue of Norfolk Now. 

According to Valentino, the majority of Botelle students in Grades 3 through 6 who are not identified as high need met or exceeded the standards for math (83 percent) and English language arts (58 percent). The big change came in the ability of all students to make progress toward reaching learning goals as measured both by the state test and the STAR assessment, which is given three times a year and benchmarks student progress nationwide.

“A student may be performing a low level, but still growing at a significant rate. Conversely, a high-performing student could be stagnating,” Valentino said.  

Both Valentino and Mary Beth Iacobelli, the school superintendent, cited the stability in Botelle staffing as an important factor in driving student growth over the past two years. Botelle had experienced a period of high turnover, but this year the only new staff members came in food service and building maintenance. 

The DOE identified 152 schools of distinction—out of a universe of 954 schools – in a detailed report issued that was issued in mid-November. In addition to Botelle, the state also recognized Barkhamsted Elementary School as a high growth school of distinction based on student performance in math. It received an accountability score of 81.8.

The accountability scores for Botelle, Barkhamsted and New Hartford’s Ann Antolini Elementary School fall within a similar range and place them within the middle two quartiles of schools. This year, the Colebrook Consolidated School dropped into the bottom quartile and received an accountability score of 67.22. Robert Gilbert, superintendent for the Colebrook Consolidated School, said overall student performance was high, but acknowledged that there are areas that require attention, specifically learning growth among high need students.