SPRINGDALE, Ark. — It’s just the first week of school and one Springdale elementary school is already celebrating a big academic win.
Bayyari Elementary School has earned the recognition of being a "Highly Effective Schools Accreditation." School officials say this has been three years of hard work, maintaining and growing identified areas that have the biggest impact on student learning and growth.
“It shows that we have implemented strong processes and procedures that are going to ensure that our students are learning at high levels. And we have those systems in place that after we teach the first time, we know the right work to do the next time to break that down even more for our students,” said Principal Mary Mullican.
Mullican says this accreditation should assure parents that they have an environment where no matter who comes to their school, they will be set up for success. She says about 76% of their students are learning English as a second language with a lot of families speaking Spanish and Marshallese.
“I think it's definitely more work to be able to get this accreditation when we're in an environment in a school that has a high population of second language learners. But I think the key is understanding and believing that no matter where our students come from, every one of them they're capable of learning at high levels,” she said.
Kim Westphal has taught kindergarten at Bayyari for two decades. She says they teach in English using a lot of pictures and modeling and that’s how they reach their second language learners.
“They will come to me and they'll say, 'Miss Westfall, I just read that.' And I'm like, 'Yes, look at all that work you're doing.' So they really do. They just light up when they finally get it and they know it, they know they're readers,” said Kim Westphal.
Michelle McEntire is also a longtime teacher at the school teaching 3rd grade for 15 years. She says it’s really exciting when someone comes into her classroom and asks her students what they are learning and they are very specific, like saying they are learning to identify character traits.
“They know they're learning targets, they have those in front of them. And I just think like, we can't expect the kids to learn if they don't know what they're learning,” said Michelle McEntire.
George Elementary School and the Don Tyson School of Innovation also earned this accreditation for the 2022-2023 school year.
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