Sterling schools upgrade language arts curriculum, ACT testing support

STERLING – Sterling Public Schools has been working to upgrade its English Language Arts curriculum and ACT preparation services for its high school students.

myPerspectives

Sterling High School’s new pilot program is a comprehensive ELA curriculum designed to help develop reading, writing, speaking and listening skills for middle and high school students. It emphasizes active learning and critical thinking, and aligns with state and national literacy standards.

SPS Director of Curriculum and Instruction Amy Downs said that before she became director, teachers relied on self-written curricula. However, the Illinois Comprehensive Literacy Plan now requires high-quality, evidence-based literacy instruction. The Illinois State Board of Education adopted the ICLP in early 2024 as a response to low literacy rates in Illinois' public schools.

To meet this mandate, Downs said that district leaders used the third-party curriculum rating system EdReports to select myPerspectives, which was recommended based on its effectiveness and ability to align with state standards.

“When we talk about aligning our curriculum vertically, as well as horizontally, that’s difficult to do when you have a teacher-written curriculum that has been changed over multiple high school English teachers,” Downs said. “So, we looked at the different curriculum programs that had been rated on EdReports with an evidence-based, research-based curriculum that had been highly effective in other school districts.”

Downs said that teachers spent the fall 2024 school semester ensuring their assessments aligned with the new curriculum. They then looked at the ISBE’s Literacy Curriculum Evaluation Rubric midway through the quarter and again at the end of the semester to evaluate its performance before finally recommending it as the core ELA curriculum for SHS.

The new curriculum’s success will be evaluated by monitoring how students are doing using common assessments within the curriculum. Downs said the new changes will not impact advanced placement courses that are managed by the College Board.

“We also will be monitoring what used to be the SAT and is now the ACT,” Downs said. “Illinois changed contracts this year and we will no longer be required to give the SAT. However, all Illinois high schools are now required to give the ACT. We will measure it as we see changes and hopefully see your students become more successful on the state assessment.”

Downs said SPS is focusing on improving those state testing scores with a new support program.

Horizon Education

Downs said that every fall, winter and spring, SPS students take assessments to benchmark and predict how students will perform on the state assessment.

“The previous program that we used was not meeting the same needs that we have now that we’ve transitioned to the ACT,” Downs said. “STAR is a 30-minute assessment that analyzes basic skills and lets us know which students might need extra support in some state standards, whereas Horizon mimics the actual test. It then gives specific reports pinpointing areas that students need targeted instruction in, that align with the sub-reports of the ACT.”

Downs said students took their first benchmark assessment using Horizon last winter, with their next one set for this spring, followed by the actual ACT in April.

“This spring we’re going to compare how we did in April with how Horizon says our students should have done when they took it in the winter and then for the spring,” Downs said. “At the end of the school year we’ll be able to compare and see if this is giving us a good prediction, and is it letting us know how our students are doing and what areas we can focus on for improvement.”