GREENSBORO, N.C. — A Guilford County School is proving it's possible to rebound and reap the rewards in academics post-pandemic.
This comes as the district's 2022 to 2023 accountability report showed increased proficiency for each grade span, compared to the year prior, with 28 schools at or above pre-COVID levels.
At Monticello-Brown Summit Elementary, school leaders credit success with a model called MTSS, meaning Multiple Tiered Systems of Support. It was a statewide initiative set to take effect before COVID, one that got sidelined until now.
In describing the model's different levels, Monticello-Brown Summit principal Robin Britt used the analogy of a birthday cake.
"They're basically layered services. The bottom layer is called "core" -- everybody gets that. That's the curriculum for math and reading. It's also the environment. When you come in in the morning, we're dancing, we're fist-bumping or calling your name out on your birthday. It's everything everybody gets. Students who don't succeed with just that, we add on another layer of the cake," Britt explained.
That next layer involves supplemental help, which Britt said should be effective enough for 95 percent of students to succeed academically and socially. For the remaining five percent, there is a third layer for intensive help. For the second and third tiers, targeted tutoring is key to student success.
How? By drawing back some of the most experienced minds in education. In 2023, Monticello-Brown Summit hired back former teachers to tutor, increasing the number of tutors to five, plus a full-time interventionist whose job it is to provide students with intensive academic support. Teachers noticed by the end of the year, students were feeling caught up and happier.
"I've seen great strides. When my kids come, and they don't know like CVD (consonant vowel consonant) words, and they leave reading passages, I just celebrate them," explained Monticello-Brown Summit acceleration co-teacher Gwen Manning.
After 36 years in other GCS classrooms and retirement in 2012, Manning now tutors reading. She encourages other former teachers, who still have the calling to serve, to consider tutoring, too.
"I love it. I love what I do now. It's just the chance to see kids grow, and I've always wanted to be a teacher, and it's in my heart still. People say, 'Well, when are you really gonna retire?'" she laughed.
Manning emphasized parents play a huge role in children's academic success and educational enjoyment. Her biggest piece of advice -- talk and read to children every night before bed.