Tech-loving teacher devises way to facilitate, track tutoring

Two years ago, for instance, when Arlington High and many other schools in the nation had strict bans on cellphones, she figured out a way to load quizzes into QR (Quick Response) codes and was quietly telling her students to take out their phones.

Engagement in her Spanish class shot up. When other teachers got wind of it, there was nothing the principal could do but lift the ban.

Last spring, she launched another mission — this time with the principal’s approval, plus cash to hire a software engineer.

The result is Studentmetrics. com, a website that allows teachers at AHS to keep track of students who need extra help and where they can go — down to the teacher and room number — to get it.

Two months after the launch, almost all of the 116 teachers are logging in daily to make assignments.

“Even teachers that hate tech love it, which is nice, because it makes their lives easier,” Land said.

Say a student missed key concepts on a quiz about cell migration, critical for understanding how the body heals itself or how embryos grow. The biology teacher finds a teacher offering the lecture somewhere in the building — likely the next day — assigns the student to it, adds a note about what specifically the student needs help with, and then can follow up to see if he actually went, all on the same screen.

As the state moves to require as much as an hour a day of tutoring for high school students struggling in math and reading, the website eliminates the paper shuffling, especially in large high schools, it takes to monitor the support.

“We used to have a paper system,” Land said.

“That’s when I realized, this is 2015, and we need to do something to get rid of paper,” she said with laugh. “So we went to Google Drive. It was doing us some good, but not the right kind of good.

Then I had a brainchild moment: ‘If you will let me hire a software engineer, I can get this fixed,’ ” she told principal Chris Duncan.

That’s where Tom Kirstein, managing partner at Mind Over Data, came in.

“Emily came to us with a concept,” he sa id. “She had some nice drawings. She talked through what she needed on the back end, and we tried a few things.”

Mind Over Data is positioning the site to sell to other districts as Tennessee expands the Response Instruction and Intervention model it adopted for elementary students in 2014.

Depending on their need, students are assigned either a half-hour or hour of extra help during the school day.

Middle schools came on last year. Next fall, every public high school in the state must provide the additional instruction and monitor the progress.

“Superi ntendents a re i ntrig ued by the opportunities and want to know more,” Arlington Superintendent Tammy Mason said.

After third period, students a re released to their predetermined destinations for 41 minutes of STRIPES (System to Reach, Intervene, Push and Enrich Students).

This semester, AHS offers 44 options in the period, four days a week, giving students 2.73 hours of targeted help in a subject beyond the hour they spend in that class. Every offering is listed on the website in colorcoded tabs. Orange is extra help. On any Tuesday this semester, for instance, four teachers are chemistr y support. Another four are tutoring in biology. The same is true for Algebra II and geometry, Spanish, economics, Latin, physics, bridge math and AP courses.

One day recently, 526 students were assigned for extra help. Everything in blue is considered enrichment for students who don’t need extra help during the week. They may attend a library computer program or be assigned to one of three art studio sessions, one of three film and video studio programs, or German, ACT math, orchestra and studio among others.

Last year’s iteration was Tiger Time, a block of support in the last period on Mondays only.

“It rea l ly li mited student choices,” Land said.

“Kids were just checking out and disappearing because it was so late in the day,” Duncan said.

“STRIPES came to me when I was on my couch at home, trying to come up with something tiger-related,” Land said. “We reach, intervene, push and enrich kids. That’s what we do. We had to break kids from Tiger Time meaning free time. We had to change the name to change the game.”

Students are told where to report by the assigning teacher. In a coming tweak, they will get a text or an email. And if their parents sign up, they will get one, too.

“The benefits already outweigh the costs,” Duncan said. “Once we are able to put everything that is beneficial to kids and helps with school individually, there’s no telling the benefits.”

Land Over Data is preparing to market the program through student licensing fees.

“Arlington is like our beta testing site,” Kirstein said. “It’s pretty easy to set up and the training is not that hard.”