Many students across the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex have struggled academically following the COVID-19 pandemic, and now a Fort Worth education group will be holding literacy clinics to help parents determine whether their child needs additional help.
Parent Shield Fort Worth will be holding various clinics to help parents determine the grade level that their child is reading at. The clinics will also have educators on hand to discuss the next steps with the parents following the testing.
Trenace Dorsey-Hollins, president of Parent Shield Fort Worth, said the clinics are meant to help parents take control of their children’s education since many students have struggled academically in the aftermath of the pandemic. The clinics will help parents determine the best course of action to help their child, and holding them over the summer allows time for any decisions that need to be made.
“The main thing is that they know what kind of conversation they need to have going into the start of the year,” Dorsey-Hollins said to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
According to Fort Worth Education Partnership, a nonprofit that seeks to “support, invest in, and coordinate opportunities that increase access to high-quality educational experiences for Fort Worth children,” only 46% of city students in grades 3-8 performed at grade level on the reading component of STAAR exams for the 2021-2022 school year. Scores for the 2022-2023 school year are expected to be made available by the Texas Education Agency (TEA) sometime in August.
As alarming as the scores were in Fort Worth, they were even worse at Dallas ISD, where only 43% of students scored in reading, according to the TEA accountability report for the 2021-2022 school year.
There are still slots open for parents in Fort Worth to have their child’s reading skills assessed by Parent Shield Fort Worth. The clinics are meant for children enrolled in kindergarten through the sixth grade. Click here to book an appointment.