Staff at Chelsea High School say new investments have paid off

At the beginning of this year, Brian Rosenbloom, the principal of Chelsea Career and Technical Education High School didn’t know how efforts to turn the school around would pan out.

As part of The Big Fix — the year-long series we’re doing in partnership with WNYC — WNYC’s education reporter Beth Fertig has checked in periodically at Chelsea as its teachers and staff try to move more students toward graduation.

Now, Rosenbloom can cite results, Fertig reports:

Earlier this month, Rosenbloom received the school’s Regents scores: more than 90 percent of the juniors passed their exams in English and U.S. history. And there were similar scores for the sophomores who took the science exam. “It’s just beyond my wildest dreams,” he said. “To see how well the kids are doing, and the teachers – the pride they’re taking and the pride the kids are taking. I mean, I had two kids yesterday jump in the arms of the teacher when they found out they got 88 and 82 on the exam.”

Rosenbloom and his teachers say investment in learning new instructional strategies made the difference, Fertig reports. But they are split on whether students’ performance should factor into teachers’ evaluations.

Listen to Fertig’s complete radio story on Chelsea High School here. And stay tuned for updates soon from Christopher Columbus High School and William E. Grady Career and Technical High School, the other two schools whose changes The Big Fix project has tracked.