Grade Level Banding Could Soon Be Coming To Little Falls

LITTLE FALLS (WJON News) -- The Little Falls School District could be restructuring the setup of two of its elementary schools. The district is looking to potentially change Lincoln and Lindbergh Elementary schools to where Lincoln would become a preschool through grade 2 and Lindbergh would become a grade 3 through grade 5 school.

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Currently Lincoln is preschool through grade 5 and Lindbergh is K through grade 5. Superintendent Greg Johnson says adopting Grade Level Banding (GLB) aligns with the district's strategic planning and it would help limit the transition for students when they advance to middle school:

"We're excited about the opportunity from a mental health standpoint for our students to really create what we're calling a one Little Falls experience within Little Falls where now all of our students beginning in kindergarten are in the same building together establishing relationships and working together."

Paul Habstritt, WJON

Johnson says GLB has several advantages for the district including letting them more effectively meet student outcomes, giving teachers additional collaboration time within grade-level teams, and equitable class sizes.

He says the district's number one goal is to help students improve:

"And our number one goal area is teaching and learning and improving student outcomes and having a consistent aligned evidenced-based program. The best way for us to do that is to get all of our teachers on the same page."

Johnson says Dr. S.G. Knight Elementary in Randall is not part of the GLB plan and it will remain a K through 5 school.

The district has had several public meetings already about GLB and the school board will discuss the timeline at a work session Monday. If all goes well in the work session the school board could potentially vote on the Grade Level Banding at the February 12th meeting.

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