The Kloiber Foundation

FCPS Trying to Focus More on Gap Reduction

We here at the Kloiber Foundation were glad to find an article in the Hearald-Leaderabout Fayette County trying to allocate more resources in the upcoming budget specifically toward gap reduction.

The article somewhat details the effort of finding the money and a possibility of where to cut back to make this happen, but goes into very little detail as to what specific projects, programs, or solutions will be funded if the money is reallocated. The only expenditure mentioned is an important one, one that we have run into as an integral need at almost every school we have talked to, that of teachers specialized for English language learners. Providing more of these teachers will go a long way in addressing one particular gap group, but it is far from the only one to address.

Our Foundation’s approach has been to help address gap reduction in a way that can be equally beneficial to every student in a school as well. There are a myriad of software programs designed to help teachers evaluate where any given student is, customize course work to get them where they should be, and provide formative assessments along the way to keep them on track. Every program we have dealt with has been shown to improve specific gap reductions as well as aid in the success of non-gap students. The goal isn’t just to bring the gap students up the level of the others, but to take them all beyond that.

Regardless of how well any given program can work or how brilliantly teachers can integrate them into their curriculum, they tend to cost money. More importantly we have found that in schools we have dealt with, schools with large gaps to address, not one has had the budget for adequate hardware to implement these programs on the scale needed. Kloiber Foundation has changed that for a few schools and programs in Fayette County. And we’re not done yet. We can’t wait to see what kind of budget this initiative receives, how they plan to use it, and how we can work together to spur on achievement in Fayette County.