By Ashley Yen ‘14

High school math classes in MCPS caught the attention of concerned parents, teachers and administrators after results had shown a majority of students failing math semester county exams. On July 1, Associate Superintendent for High Schools Christopher Garran sent a memo to all high school math resource teachers and administrators regarding a new effort to boost student success and overall grades. Every high school was asked to create action plans for a chosen focus group, and recieved a visit from an MCPS official. Don Kress, Acting High School Performance Director, came to Sherwood to track the progress of the plan.

Principal Intern James Allrich, Math Resource teacher Sapna Chaudhry and Principal Bill Gregory are responsible for Sherwood’s effort. They decided on a focus group of 39 juniors currently taking Geometry. Although not required, all the juniors taking geometry have chosen to partake in this effort to boost math success.

Students assemble together on designated Tuesdays every month with one of the four geometry teachers to go over recent quizzes, tests and homework assignments. The juniors are not particularly failing the class, but the intention of the school’s efforts are that they meet one of the 7 Keys to College Readiness, that all seniors should graduate after taking Algebra 2 with a grade of C or higher.

“We can feed two birds with one seed,” Allrich said, in that the juniors are in line for passing the class and final exam as well as making certain that they will be taking Algebra 2 during senior year.

Chaudhry and Allrich both believe this program is contributing to efforts to boost math success, but concrete results will only be revealed after at least the first semester of this school year. They both believe that if this plan proves to be effective, it could definitely expand into further efforts. “I’m fully supportive [of] this new plan but my only request is that we should receive more support and funding for this effort from the county,” said Chaudhry.