Paul+Cuffee+School+Description

**Maria Charbonneau**
 * Paul Cuffee Maritime Charter School**

**Introduction:** The Paul Cuffee Maritime Charter School for Providence Youth encompasses three separate buildings located within Providence, Rhode Island. The elementary school is comprised of grades K-5, the middle school is comprised of grades 6-8, and the high school is comprised of only 9th and 10th grades. Currently, Michael Obel- Omia is the head of the Paul Cuffee Charter School. Paul Cuffee Charter School first opened its door in 2001 with only four grades: K through grade 3.

Today, Paul Cuffee’s students are admitted through lottery and there is a waiting list to get into the lower, middle, and high schools. However, for the purpose of this research project, only the elementary school will be reviewed. By analyzing the data available from Paul Cuffee Charter School’s student survey results and from the 2011 Rhode Island School Report Card, one can better compare Paul Cuffee Charter School to a regular public school of Rhode Island.

**Demographics:**

The Paul Cuffee school is located within Providence, the capital of Rhode Island. Providence, as the most populous city in the state, is home to 47 public schools which serve over 30,000 students.In all, there are 178,053 inhabitants in Providence and of that number, 41, 634 are children. Some of those children are educated within the walls of the Paul Cuffee School. The Paul Cuffee elementary school has a higher ratio of girls in its classes than there are boys. Of these students, 56% identify as Hispanic or Latino, 32% identify as White and 38% identify as Black or African American. These statistics give one a better sense of the makeup of The Paul Cuffee elementary school.

**Student Achievement:** The NECAP results for the 2011-2012 school year showed that third graders at Paul Cuffee had the same test scores as the other state students did for reading at 73% but lower test scores than the other state students for math by 11%. For children a year older, in fourth grade, math and reading scores showed to be higher than the scores in the same category for other Rhode Island students. However, in the science category, fourth graders at Paul Cuffee scored 20% lower than the other state students in the science category. The fifth graders of Paul Cuffee scored slightly higher than other state students in the math and writing categories on the NECAP exam but lower in the reading category by 4%.

As reported by these students in a student survey, 42.4% claimed never to do homework, while 12.1% claimed to spend 2 hours or more on homework a night. In comparison, 34.4% of students statewide claimed never to do homework at night while only 9.1% reported doing homework for more than two hours a night. And, interestingly, in a world where technology is quickly progressing, 63% of students at Paul Cuffee School do not use computers in class whereas 70% of Rhode Island students do use computer technology in the classrooms. This could account for the higher test scores on the NECAP standardized evaluation as a whole documented from the students of Paul Cuffee in comparison to Providence and to the rest of the state of Rhode Island.According the NECAP results for Rhode Island, in 2007, Paul Cuffee students scored much higher than the other, regular Providence public schools but lower than the other public school students in the rest of Rhode Island. This trend continued up until 2011. In 2011, the students of Paul Cuffee scored just as high as the other public school students in Rhode Island and vastly higher than Providence school students.

**Teaching:** In regards to teachers at Paul Cuffee Charter School, 50% students reported that their teachers instill a desire to learn more and 35% endeavor to make that learning fun for the student. It is interesting to note that 6% of teachers at Paul Cuffee are not highly qualified. In comparison, the state of Rhode Island only has 3% of its teachers who are not highly qualified. Furthermore, there is a 1:10 teacher-student ratio seen at Paul Cuffee whereas the state has a 1:11 teacher-student ratio. I found this surprising because this is not a huge difference. I expected a much broader gap between these two data statistics because the premise of charter schools is that there is more individualized attention there than in other public schools.

**Families and Communities:** At Paul Cuffee Charter School, 76% of students who attend are eligible for subsidized lunches. This number is much larger than the 44% of the state who are eligible for subsidized lunches. In addition, there is a one percent difference in the number of students who receive ESL/Bilingual Education Services at Paul Cuffee Charter School and those who receive those services in the rest of the state. Only 5% of Paul Cuffee students receive these services whereas 6% of the state receive the same services. Furthermore, it is interesting to note that 14% of Paul Cuffee students are receiving special education services. This is only slightly lower than the percentage of other public Rhode Island schools who have students receiving special education services, at 16%.

**Safe and Supportive Schools:** Most importantly, arguably, the majority of students at Paul Cuffee feel relatively safe while at school; 89% reported that they feel safe walking through the halls of school. However, 21% reported having been the victim of theft at school and 60% reported being the victim of at least 1 type of bullying. In comparison with the rest of the state, this is 10% higher than the average number students reported at other public Rhode Island schools. Additionally, 21% of Paul Cuffee students have been in a fight while at school. There was a 1% positive difference reported in the number of students who use illegal drugs at Paul Cuffee School and those who use at other public schools in Rhode Island. In the 2010-2011 school year, there were 44 cases of suspension in the elementary school at Paul Cuffee Charter School. Statistically, Paul Cuffee has a 97% rate of student attendance whereas the state has an attendance rate of 95%. Contrastingly, Paul Cuffee has a "chronic absentee" rate of only 3% while the state has a rate of 18%.

**Funding and Resources:** In regards to school resources, Paul Cuffee School students reported that they found their school aesthetically pleasing and that there were plenty of resources such as hand soap, and other toiletries. According to the information located on the Infoworks site, the district which contains the Paul Cuffee Charter School, in 2009, had a district median family income of $32, 058 and a district property value per student value of $378,009.90. Furthermore, it is important to note that this district spent $15,305 per student in the year 2009.

**Conclusion:** According to the 2011 Rhode Island Report Card, a target score of 83.9 was set for The Paul Cuffee School in the English Language Arts category and the target score was exceeded with 90.3. In the Mathematics category, a target score of 73.1 was set and was exceeded with a score of 86.0. Furthermore, an attendance rate target score of 90% was also exceeded with a score of 96.3%. As a result, The Paul Cuffee School was classified as “Met AYP” according to Rhode Island’s guidelines after 21 targets were evaluated and met. In summation, The Paul Cuffee Charter School is on par with the rest of Rhode Island and far ahead of other Providence public schools when it comes to testing well on standardized exams. However, it is distressing that there is a higher average of bullying cases and fights that occur within Paul Cuffee’s walls than in other public schools in Rhode Island. While Paul Cuffee School passed every target score as part of Rhode Island’s Report Card, it should now focus on making school life even better for the student.