New program targets Donna migrant students
DONNA — The Morning Migrant, a new tutorial program for migrant students at Donna schools, aims to boost grades and graduation rates via handheld computer programs and new roles for faculty.
To bolster an existing migrant program, the school district has introduced Study Buddy, a digital learning resource designed to help students overcome obstacles they may experience in math and reading, district officials said last week.
Study Buddy software is tailored to individual state requirements for learning and coincides with curriculums at specific grade levels.
“We have 35 Study Buddies,” said Abel Muñoz, director of the school district’s migrant education program. “The purpose of (Study Buddy) is to provide differentiated instruction for our migrant students. These are (bought with) the monies that are sent to the district through the migrant program. This is one of the big pluses of the program.”
Ramiro A. Gonzalez, migrant strategist at the W.A. Todd 9th Grade Campus, said the program is growing and has recently experienced a jump in its numbers.
“We’re averaging from 16-17 kids a day but close to 100 total,” Gonzalez said. “It’s a program that is working very well. We’ve been excited about the kids who have shown up for the tutorials because they don’t have to come. It’s completely voluntary.”
Though the Donna school district has had a migrant tutorial program, 2007 marks the first year the school board has implemented a migrant strategist at each of its high schools and middle schools.
The migrant strategist gives students a representative to interact with on a daily basis and helps recruit more participants for the 7 a.m. tutorial sessions, officials said.
“The main role and responsibility of the migrant strategist is to provide supplemental and educational services to migrant students making a grade lower than 70 and keep them from failing the course at the end of the year,” Muñoz said.
The 2007 school year will be used to measure the success of the Morning Migrant program in the future, officials said.
“Right now we can’t measure success in percentages and numbers,” Muñoz said. “We’re measuring success in the number of students who are participating and who are motivated.”
Muñoz also said students who participate in the program have started to score higher in core subjects, including reading, math, science and history.
Rene Reyna, director of federal programs for the school district, said migrant students have traditionally been at a disadvantage because of their yearly schooling schedules. Migrant students typically switch schools at different times of the year than their peers.
“Migrant students are our most mobile population,” Reyna said. “They are coming in late in the year and leaving early in the year, so the program provides them an opportunity to catch up to the level of the student that doesn’t leave.”
As far as long-term goals for the Morning Migrant program, district officials are focused on a boost in graduation rates among the migrant population and hope to see the effects of the program as early as next school year.
