Washington County Enterprise-Leader
Farmington Gets AAIMS Invitation
FARMINGTON — Farmington High has been selected to join the next group of schools that will be a part of the Arkansas Advanced Initiative for Math and Science.
The Farmington School Board passed a resolution March 17 in support of the high school joining the AAIMS program.
Already, 38 schools across the state are involved in the initiative and divided into five cohorts. Farmington will join Cohort 6, a new cohort that will have four to six new schools.
Principal Jon Purifoy said schools involved in AAIMS (pronounced “aims”) are seeing phenomenal growth in their Advanced Placement programs. The initiative provides professional development for teachers, helps with increasing the number of students taking AP courses, gives strategies to help students improve their AP scores and encourages schools to offer additional AP classes.
Clayton Williams, instructional facilitator, said the program will require a commitment from staff and teachers. One of the features is Saturday workshops to help students prepare for their AP exams.
“I’m excited to push this even further,” Williams said.
Another benefit, said Assistant Superintendent Clint Jones, is that the program provides instructors who teach AP classes as well as those who score AP exams.
“What we want to do is to provide teachers even more support,” Jones said. “They will work one-on-one with our faculty. It’s utilizing the specialists.”
For 2013, 36 percent of AP students at Farmington High scored a 3 or better on their exams. This is above the state average but Farmington “wants to do better than 36 percent,” Jones said.
Ken James, president of AAIMS, said Farmington submitted an application to join the initiative and then program officials visited the high school to observe AP classes in math, science and English.
James said the officials observed that Farmington has “strong classroom practices” and identified opportunities for growth in increasing the number of students taking AP courses and in helping more students score a 3, 4 or 5 on their AP end-of-course exams. Students who score a 3 or higher can earn college credit in most cases.
Farmington High and AAIMS entered into a letter of agreement, James said. The next step will be to finalize the letter of agreement. Farmington will pay a program fee that will provide the school with content access and professional development. James said the fee will depend on the services that Farmington uses from the initiative. He did not know yet what Farmington’s fee would be.
Arkansas was one of seven states selected to receive a National Math and Science Initiative grant in 2007. Going back to the initial year, the progress the state has made in its AP program has been tremendous, James said. More students are taking AP classes, more students are scoring well on the tests and teachers are receiving professional development to be better prepared in the classroom.
James said the Legislature identified the AP curriculum as the way for Arkansas to increase the rigor of its classes and prepare students for the next level, whether it is a two-year college, four-year college or to go into the workforce.
“We’re excited that Farmington has taken the step to form a partnership with us. They will be a nice addition to the program,” James said, adding, “We received an excellent reception at the Farmington High School and in the district office.”
Bryan Law, superintendent, said Farmington has tried to join AAIMS for about three years.