Calvert Curriculum

YOU HAVE to understand, there is no school system. At best, what you have in Baltimore is a loose confederation of schools."So said Richard C. Hunter, former city school superintendent, a few months after his arrival here amid great anticipation that he might lead a dramatic turnaround in Baltimore schools.Hunter was right, of course. But his feeble response to that loose confederation in large part contributed to his downfall. He tried to tame that undisciplined conglomeration by "reorganizing" the bureaucracy and forcing the schools to fit into a neatly aligned structure.

GERTRUDE WILLIAMS tangled with two superintendents and beat them both.Richard C. Hunter lost his job in part because he underestimated the principal of Barclay School. A few years later, Walter G. Amprey beat a hasty retreat after trying to show Williams who had the power.She did.It was the curriculum of the private Calvert School that established Williams' reputation, that and her in-your-face style. Installing the Calvert program at Barclay, a Charles Village public school where nine of 10 students live in poverty, she demonstrated that poor kids can learn, too. She made Barclay perhaps Maryland's most famous public school, visited by educators and journalists from around the world.

At first glance, the most recent test scores from Baltimore's elementary schools look like the vital signs of a patient in intensive care.Thousands of the city's public school students progressed only a few months in their 180 days, and many schools seemed to slump in the second grade.The results for some grades so depressed school board President J. Tyson Tildon that he remarked: "I want to cry."But take a closer look, some experts said yesterday, and the patient's vital signs may not be critical.

Pre-first: watered-down first grade or souped-up kindergarten?A gift of time or a theft of opportunity?A gentle boost for students not quite ready for school or an elitist strategy by parents trying to ensure that their children are at the top of their class?Wedged between kindergarten and first grade, pre-first can be all of the above, depending on one's perspective.In the Baltimore area, pre-first was a private-school creation, adopted by some schools more than 20 years ago to address the needs of youngsters with birthdays late in the year or with developmental clocks running slightly behind their chronological age.More recently, the idea of delaying the start of school for some youngsters has gained currency among public school parents, some of whom postpone the start of kindergarten by a year or send their children to kindergarten for two years.

Heartened by the success of a 3-year-old partnership between a Baltimore public school and the private Calvert School, city Superintendent Walter G. Amprey said last night that he is looking into expanding Calvert's role into a few other city schools.Dr. Amprey said that school administrators, school board members and Calvert officials will discuss a possible expansion of the Calvert program beyond the Barclay School in Charles Village, where the unique partnership began.Key questions, including financing for any such expansion, remain unanswered, but the superintendent said the overwhelming success of the collaboration prompted administrators and school board members to look for ways -- and financing -- to expand.

Problems at Callaway Elementary School began on the first day, when eager parents arrived and helped teachers open boxes containing new teaching materials.What they saw inside the boxes shocked them: reproductions of social studies booklets from the 1950s that parents believe portray blacks and Eskimos in an offensive and racially stereotyped way.School officials quickly took the offending booklets away and said they will substitute relevant materials in the classroom. But the initial misstep has become a symbol for the difficulties a nonprofit, church affiliated group -- which ordered the school materials -- has had in taking over a city public school.

School arrived recently at the Knickman family home in Jarrettsville in a white cardboard box sent from a warehouse in Northwest Baltimore. The familiar carton with the silhouette logo has been sent to Edward and Carol Knickman every summer since they started home-schooling their daughter, Clare, 13, and son, Thomas, 11, seven years ago. Calvert School Education Services, the nonprofit home instruction division of the Calvert School in North Baltimore, has...

25 years ago (week of August 8-14, 1971):The State Roads Commission met with Howard County and state legislators to discuss the county's road and highway requirements over the next 20 years. The financial picture for the next 20 years was described as "bleak." It was estimated that it would take 10 years just to complete the current five-year critical needs program.50 years ago (week of August 4-10, 1946):The Kindergarten Club of Elkridge met at the home of Rev. Charles Durkee to make plans for the new Elkridge Kindergarten, which would open the same day as county public schools.

While the much-heralded partnership between the city's Barclay School and the private Calvert School is to end after six years, the principal who fought to bring Calvert's curriculum to the public school says she's not about to abandon it now.Barclay, said Principal Gertrude Williams, intends to keep using Calvert textbooks, supplies and detailed lesson plans stressing mastery of the basics.One key ingredient, however, will be missing: direct Calvert School oversight, in which staff from the North Baltimore school visit Barclay regularly, closely monitor the progress of children and observe lessons.

Baltimore officials are taking steps to adapt a rigorous private school curriculum -- credited with improving two city public schools -- for use in every elementary school in the system.According to documents obtained by The Sun, city and Abell Foundation officials have been discussing plans to write a curriculum for students in kindergarten through eighth grade that would be modeled after that of the private Calvert School."For so long, there has been the criticism and the concern that we were not taking greater advantage of the success of the program" at Barclay Elementary-Middle and Carter G. Woodson Elementary, schools Superintendent Walter G. Amprey said yesterday.