Derryfield has a splendid tradition of having an Athletics Assembly at the end of each trimester to honor the high school student athletes who just completed a sports season. While the athletes and coaches are the stars of the gathering, I have the honor of introducing the event. The following are notes from my introduction of the Athletics Assembly on Monday, March 8th, 2010.
"Every Sunday I get the New Your Times delivered, and reading it is one of the joys of my Sunday evening. I do my best to read it in order, but I save the magazine section for last. I know this all sounds very old-school to you – guilty! And every once in a while a cover story comes along that I particularly enjoy. Yesterday’s was called 'Building a Better Teacher' – here is a brief excerpt:
The testing mandates in governmental policies over the last several years have generated a sea of data, and researchers have been parsing student achievement in ways they never had before.
A new generation of economists devised statistical methods to measure the “value added” by a teacher to a student’s performance by almost every factor imaginable: class size versus per-pupil funding versus curriculum versus on and on and on.
When researchers ran the numbers in dozens of different studies, every factor under a school’s control produced just a tiny impact, except for one: which teacher the student had.
Some teachers could regularly lift their students’ test scores above the average for children of the same race, class and ability level. Others’ students left with below-average results year after year.
Statistician now agree that a student with a weak teacher for three straight years would score, on average, 50 percentile points behind a similar student with a strong teacher for those years. Teachers working in the same building, teaching the same grade, produced very different outcomes. And the gaps were huge.
Similarly, a Stanford economist, found that while the top 5 percent of teachers were able to impart a year and a half’s worth of learning to students in one school year, as judged by standardized tests, the weakest 5 percent advanced their students only half a year of material each year.
I can hear you thinking 'Mr. Sellers has forgotten this is an athletics assembly.'
No – hear me out. This is the point: Great teaching is the same as great coaching, and Derryfield is blessed with adult coaches at the top of their game, helping great student athletes at the top of their game.
Coaches who can help you improve two seasons worth in one season. People who are absolutely committed to helping you Aim High while improving your ability to have lead a balanced life.
So we are here to celebrate great coaching and great athletes, and from here our Athletics Director will take over. Mr. McCaigue, thank you once again for leading us in a fine season. I look forward to your words.
CNS
