The little school that could
Standing Rock School passes AYP for fifth year

Standing Rock Elementary school fourth-graders Charmaine Morgan and Shelby Lynn Thompson receive help from their teacher Marcella Willetto on Thursday. The BIA funded school recently passed its Annual Yearly Progress goals. [Photo by Brian Leddy/Independent]

By Karen Francis
Diné Bureau

STANDING ROCK — Tséiíahi Community School, a small Bureau of Indian Affairs-funded school in the community of Standing Rock, has done what no school in the Gallup-McKinley School District has been able to do — pass the state standard of adequate yearly progress.

Situated just by the standing rock for which the community is named for, the school has been there since 1935. Today about 115 pupils attend the school.

Because of its small size, the teachers and the principal know almost all the children and their families — many have even taught their pupils’ parents.

Principal Rebecca Vesely has been at the school, which teaches kids in kindergarten through fourth grade, since 2000. During that period, the only time that the school didn’t meet state standards was the first two years after the implementation of adequate yearly progress to measure proficiency.

After not meeting the standard, the staff and teachers began working as a team to plan how to get their pupils proficient.

“We looked at our whole set-up, our program as a whole,” Vesely said.

Also helping the school out was the federally funded FOCUS program, which allowed it to hire specialists to analyze data to determine where gaps in education existed.

As a BIA-funded school, Vesely said that it enjoys more local autonomy than a public school and has been able to base the curriculum on what works for the community.

“As long as it follows state, national and tribal requirements, we have a little more flexibility,” she said.

Apparently the plan has worked, and the school is one of the few BIA-funded schools on the Navajo Nation that met adequate yearly progress goals in 2007.

Pupils’ opinion
In the school’s fourth-grade class, pupils were eager to tell the Independent why they like their school.

Zachary Cook, 10, said that he likes science and reading at school because “it’s very fun.”

He added that he likes to help say prayers for different events, which he learned in the school’s Navajo language classes.

Shelby Lynn Thompson enjoys math, reading and science and said, “I like the teachers because they teach nice.”
Another pupil, Cheyenne Bates, said, “The saddest thing I don’t like about school is going home.”

Ethan Joe put it best when he simply said, “We love to learn.”

Vesely attributes the success of the school to the teachers, the pupils and the families all becoming involved.
“I have a really strong teaching staff. They’ve gone the extra mile for the kids,” she said.

Tammy Lankford has been at the school for more than 20 years. She is currently teaching the first grade.

“We really care for our kids and we have their interest at heart,” Lankford said. “We know what to do and we get it done.”

She added that the school has high expectations of pupils.

Vesely agreed saying, “We have really high expectations for our kids. We truly believe our kids can be successful.”
The pride that the teachers have in their pupils is evident to the visitor.

One of the kindergarten teachers, Barbara Whitehair, said, “I’m proud of my kids. They’re really doing a good job.”

With the new standards, kindergartners must learn to read by Christmas, which didn’t used to be required, she said. On the day the Independent visited, they were all ready writing sentences.

“If they’re struggling, we help each other out,” Whitehair said.

As for the other teachers, some of them say that much of the success is because of the small size of the school.

Small school
Jean Upshaw, who helps to teach the third grade which is the largest class, said that the success is due to the small size of the school and the amount of time the teachers spend with the kids.

“It’s a lot of one-on-one teaching,” she said.

She said it helps that the teachers know all the kids and their parents.

“Being a small school really helps,” Marble Willetto, fourth-grade teacher, echoed. “I think all the teachers know all the children.”

She added that she has pupils who really like to be challenged and attend school regularly.

Last week, Vesely was visiting classrooms to observe teachers and pupils, which is part of the effort to continue improving.

“I want to see what’s really going on in the classroom,” she said.

In addition to classroom observations, pupils are tested to help find what needs to be worked on in the classroom.

“The really big thing we’ve learned to do is use our data. Schools actually have a lot of data,” Vesely said. “A lot of success we’ve had is because we’ve learned how to use it.”

She said that to succeed, everyone has to be involved.
To help include parents, the school has family nights. At the last family night, more than 100 people showed up.
“It starts at home,” she said.

What could be most important is that the children are eager to learn.

“I think our kids enjoy being here in school,” Vesely said.
While Vesely visited the classrooms, pupils ran up to her and hugged her, showed her their latest accomplishments or asked for help with their assignments. Vesely took the time to talk with each child who approached her.

Pupils are rewarded for academics and attendance, but also for citizenship.

Vesely told about how one little boy was struggling with an assignment and one of his classmates went up to him and explained the assignment to him. She even patted him on the back when he understood.

Such acts do not go unrecognized at the school. A behavior tree is on display for when kids are caught doing some act of kindness. Pupils earn the chance to win prizes or field trips.

To help the student-teacher ratio, teachers have assistants and the kindergartners utilize the foster grandparent program.

“We love having them here,” Vesely said.

Vesely said that because science is now one of the testing areas, the school has been building science proficiency for its pupils.

“I think we’re doing a real good job because our kids are really good at science fairs,” Vesely said.

The third graders will be taking the standards test for the first time and they were practicing on school computers last week.

Tiffany Blackbold, the teacher for the third-grade class, said that her class was doing great.

“We had a surprising test result — 95 percent are showing increases in math, science and reading and 60 percent are showing an increase in science,” Blackbold said.

The fourth-grade teacher Willetto was also optimistic and proudly proclaimed, “I can see some real good scores coming out of this class.”

To promote literacy and writing, pupils, teachers and parents publish their own stories. The first-grade class adopted a bear named Teddy with the kids writing stories about Teddy’s adventures.

“These books are going home,” Vesely said. “It’s family literacy. She added pupils also have mandatory homework to read 30 minutes each evening. The at-home reading and the self-published books help the school to promote family literacy.

“They can read to their parents, their grandmas, grandpas, aunties,” she said.

Vesely said that parents often come in and tell her that instead of asking for toys, children are asking for books.

“One of the things we try to do is keep the kids actively involved,” Vesely said. The same philosophy applies to the school’s 14 special needs children. Where some schools are satisfied to group their special needs pupils separately, the Tséiíahi Community School includes all special needs kids in regular classes.

“Every one of these children should be getting served through regular education programs,” Vesely said. “What I tell staff is they’re all our kids.”