school info
Mintie White Elementary School is one of 20 Pájaro Valley Unified School District (PVUSD) elementary schools and is centrally located in Watsonville, California. The school serves 550 students in kindergarten through fifth grades.
In October 2005 the California Basic Educational Data System (CBEDS) identified Mintie White’s student population as 98.2% Hispanic and 1.3% White non-Hispanic, compared to the district’s totals of 77.1% Hispanic and 19.8% White non-Hispanic. During the 2005-2006 school year, 98% of Mintie White’s students qualified for the federally subsidized free and reduced lunch program ( one indicator of low income) compared to 63.3% district-wide In April 2005, 74.5% of Mintie White’s students, compared to 46.6% of the students district-wide, were classified as English Language Learners (ELLs) on the state’s Language Census (R-30. Nearly all of the school’s and district’s ELLS are Spanish speakers.
In 2004-2005, after meeting its Academic Performance Index (API) growth targets for 2 years in a row, Mintie White School did not meet its API targets. The overall improvement target for 2004-05 was 9 points. Mintie White gained 8 points, just 1 point short of the target. The subgroup target was 7. Hispanic students gained 6, and socio-economically disadvantaged students gained 3 points. Since 1999, Mintie White has posted a total overall gain of 113 points, most of which came with a 75 point increase in 2002-03. The current API is 634, while Hispanic students’ API is 629 and disadvantaged students posted a score of 624. In 2005-2006 we did not meet our API, but we re-designated 76 students to English Proficient status. We have met our AYP in math every year.
Mintie White School has made significant strides on its NCLB targets. In 2004-05, the Annual Measurable Objectives (AMOs) were met in Mathematics but not English Language Arts. In, 31.8% of the students scored at/above proficient. This was well above the target of 26.5%. All subgroups also made Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in Mathematics. In English Language Arts, 12.8% of the students scored proficient or advanced, a figure that is well below the target of 24.4%. Since, 2002, the baseline year for AYP, the percent of students scoring proficient or above in ELA has more than doubled (from 5.8% overall in 2002 to 12.8% in 2005), and in Mathematics the percent has almost tripled (from 11.3% to 31.8%).
These long term gains are due in large part to the school’s concerted effort over the past three years to implement a well-coordinated, standards-based curriculum in every classroom, providing needed materials, instructional support, professional development and parent outreach to support instructional improvement and improved student outcomes. Mintie White offers Sheltered English Immersion programs and an Early Exit Alternative Bilingual Program to students.Our goal is to ensure that every child is at grade level in English by the end of third grade.