Secret readers and incredible achievers: El Puente School is putting books in the hands of students

Located in the “Salad Bowl of the World” and the hometown of famous American author John Steinbeck, El Puente School is an independent study school of choice in the Salinas Union High School District in Salinas, California. A population of more than 150,000, the region is known for producing a sizable amount of the nation’s lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, broccoli, strawberries, and cauliflower because of its near-perfect weather conditions. Salinas is recognized as the emerging AgTech capital of the nation. With close proximity to Silicon Valley, along with a large number of agricultural companies around the area, Salinas is also a natural spot for high-tech agricultural innovations.

The district in Salinas consists of four middle schools, five comprehensive high schools, and serves more than 15,500 students. El Puente itself serves around 280 7–12 students which position it well to support students’ individualized needs. Of those students, 50 are English Learners and around 20 are considered Special Education. The school specializes in serving students who are behind in credits by at least one semester for their grade level or choose to attend an alternative education school with a flexible course schedule to fit their work schedules.

The challenge

Providing access to different books

Jenifer Carr, an English language development teacher, and nominee for Teacher of the Year for the district in 2018 has been with the school for more than six years now. While familiar with Renaissance, she, along with others, convinced the school to purchase Renaissance myON^® Reader and myON^® News, powered by News-O-Matic, to take their reading instruction a step further.

Jenifer prides herself on finding books of high interest for her students—it’s what she does. She knows for a fact that students will eat up books from the Orca series or High Noon books. However, even sometimes for her, a couple of students can be tough to crack.

Looking to hook her students on digital books and provide more reading options, she started using myON Reader and myON News, powered by News-O-Matic, this past March in her classroom. She had a few students who weren’t reading a ton outside of assigned coursework, along with students who read, but not enough to make sizeable progress.

The results

Students reading after hours and choosing to spend time at school

It’s difficult to highlight just a couple of her students. Jenifer can point to each one and highlight their progress, as well as their favorite books. A student who read for hours on end on a Chromebook while in the hospital and saw their Lexile score jump from 715 to 1240. Another student who read every “Princess” book available to her four-year-old sister, noting that her sister pointed at the pictures, said the words and repeated parts of the stories. Students reading on their iPhones outside of the classroom and choosing to come in and read during lunch. Students reading books together and looking up at each other at twists and turns in the plot. However, there are a few students that jump out even more when talking to Jenifer.

“One student in our Special Education program comes to mind. I noticed he hadn’t read anything all fall and winter, despite trying to find books for him,” recalled Jenifer. “We got the two products in March, so when I checked on what he was doing in there, I noticed he had read all these books about hunting. And when I thought about it, I didn’t have any hunting books in our classroom library.”

Students like Carlos, a grade 12 student, have also benefited. While Carlos has always been a reader, his reading took off when myON Reader was introduced. In fact, his Lexile jumped from 1215 in March to 1345 in August—130 points in just five months (with summer vacation in between).

To date, students have read 33.7K minutes on myON Reader as well as 1,294 minutes on myON News, powered by News-O-Matic—impressive considering the super short time students have had access. While Jenifer plans to roll it out schoolwide and give students more time with the news articles, she can’t help notice the benefits just in her classroom.

“When my students come in each morning, they have to read one news article and take a quiz before reading something else. To have them read about what’s going on in the world and at their personal reading level, it’s great because it’s nonfiction content and they’re choosing topics that interest them,” said Jenifer.

It’s great because it’s nonfiction content and they’re choosing topics that interest them.

Jenifer Carr, Teacher, El Puente School

Paired with Renaissance Star Assessments, each student’s progress is being measured every six weeks and being used to identify students at risk. The Star Diagnostic Report has proven to be beneficial as other teachers can see where their students are and where improvements are needed. For example, when Jenifer’s next-door teacher neighbor noticed that his students were scoring low, he sent them over to Jenifer’s room to pick out some books and read on myON. Eric Deleissegues, the principal at El Puente, picked up on that and noticed that many of the school’s graduates were coming through Jenifer’s room.

“Jenifer has all the intangibles, but there’s something to be said about myON,” concluded Eric. “Today’s students are digital natives and the two products play into that with being available on almost any device. We rolled out them out in the spring and now we’re looking forward to having it for a full school year. Word is spreading around the area because I got an email the other day from another principal hoping to see how we’re using Renaissance products together to drive growth.”

Jenifer has all the intangibles, but there’s something to be said about myON.

Eric Deleissegues, Principal, El Puente School

You could say there’s quite a bit of growth happening around Salinas, California.