By WILLIAM M. HARTNETT
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
SARASOTA - Caroline Schermer says she did pretty well on the SAT college entrance exam last year.
"Pretty well" was a score of 1260. "Last year" was the seventh grade. And Schermer didn't seem all that impressed.
Never mind that, five years before she'll head off to college, her score is only slightly below the average of the University of Florida's freshman class.
It's just another routine feat of implausible intelligence by a girl who withdrew from a private academy that includes the phrase "superior academic program" in its mission statement because "It just wasn't as challenging as I wanted."
What's more remarkable than Schermer's considerable personal achievements is that she is more the rule than the exception at her school, Sarasota County's Pine View School for the Gifted.
As its name implies, all of Pine View's more than 1,500 students in grades two through 12 meet the state's definition of gifted, the only such public school in the state.
Among the many ways in which that designation sets Pine View apart from traditional schools is that classes are taught a grade level above normal. And because every student at the school can absorb information more readily than most children his age, material is covered at an accelerated pace.
"We don't dwell on anything they already know," said Assistant Principal Brenda George. "If they understand it on Monday, they don't need to hear it Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday."
As in most years, every member of the 2001 graduating class went to college. Its 119 members are spread out among 41 universities, from Dartmouth and Duke to Samford and Stanford. Their average SAT score was 1320, and 25 were National Merit Scholars.
The school has been criticized for taking the smartest students from schools around the county, and some complain that it drains resources from the rest of the district. Though Pine View does receive extra grants and bonuses because of its gifted students and programs, the school's per-pupil spending is still lower than that of many poor schools around the state.
The Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test also reflects Pine View's otherworldly standards. The school's average scores are first in the state in nearly every grade level and subject, in many cases by gaping margins.
The school stands out even after being adjusted for the effects of family income in a statistical analysis of FCAT scores by The Palm Beach Post. One would expect Pine View to do well on the state tests not just because its students are gifted, but because few of them come from poor families.
Across Florida, schools that serve the most affluent families consistently score higher than those with many poorer students. And just one of every 16 Pine View students qualifies for free or reduced-price lunch, an indicator of low family income.
Aside from being 20 points above the state's next-best school, Pine View's eighth-grade FCAT reading score, for example, is 14 percent higher than the average for every school in the state with a similar economic profile.
"Higher-level questions are part of what we do," George said. "You're not going to see any FCAT rallies or T-shirts here."
Principal Steve Largo says the school "does not do a whole bunch out of the ordinary for the FCAT."
"Any time you're boiling down a school to a letter grade, you're missing a lot of factors," Largo said. "Yes, our students do perform at high levels as measured by standardized testing. But I really think what is just as valuable is the climate, culture and environment of high expectations."
Expectations.
It's the philosophical focal point for much of the debate over the FCAT and standardized testing in general. Critics of analyses such as The Post's, including Gov. Jeb Bush, say comparing test scores to poverty creates a separate set of expectations for rich and poor students. Every child can learn, the thinking goes, so every child should be measured against the same standards.
Teachers, administrators and parents at Pine View say their high expectations stem not just from having extraordinarily talented children, but from their desire to push those students beyond even their own lofty goals.
So what's being done at Pine View that can't be applied to traditional schools? Again and again, teachers at the school give the same answer: nothing.
Nothing, if a school has a hyper-dedicated faculty and zealously helpful parent association.
"I taught the same way at other schools," said third-grade teacher Denis Maughan. "But I did it all by myself. No other teachers, no parents. Here, let's just say that whenever we have field trips, we always have way too many chaperones."
Pine View's parent group is an incorporated nonprofit organization, said President Kathy Coffey, whose two children attend the school. Parents logged more than 20,000 volunteer hours last year, Coffey said.
"I gave up my profession," she said. "And my children are my profession now."
Among the most striking aspects of Pine View is the wide latitude students are given, the level of trust afforded even the youngest students. Second- and third-graders get to choose whether they eat lunch outside or in the cafeteria. Fourth-graders get their own lockers.
The scene on campus during the nearly one-hour lunch period would be alarming at most schools. Students wander in and out of the cafeteria at will, and almost the entire campus seems at their disposal.
"That would be the interesting experiment at other schools," Largo said of the freedom he grants students. It might not translate perfectly to more regimented traditional schools where students are forever standing in lines and sitting in assigned seats, he said, but maybe it needs to be tried.
For all their impressive test scores and mature conduct, Pine View students still look and act like the children that, after all, they are.
"We have a lot of bright students, but they're kids first," George said.
Copyright 2001 Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc.
Palm Beach Post (Florida)
December 16, 2001 Sunday
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