A progressive form on math education, already in place in Evanston/Skokie School District 65 elementary schools, will follow students into middle school next fall, the board said Monday.

Everyday Mathematics, created by University of Chicago’s School Mathematics Project, seeks to develop higher-order thinking and problem-solving skills in children through new instructional methods and materials.

“The ultimate goal is to help students understand math,” said assistant superintendent Barbara Hiller. “We now need to teach kids problem-solving skills because they are living in a different world.”

Everyday Mathematics has been implemented at all District 65 elementary schools and at Nichols Middle School since 1997, Hiller said.

Results of the program at District 65 have been encouraging, but they were not as dramatic as they could have been, Hiller said.

About 30 percent of District 65’s fifth graders failed to meet state math standards in 2001, an improvement from 41 percent in 1999.

A study by two Iowa educators found that about 80 percent of children at Iowa schools that strongly implemented Everyday Mathematics met skills standards.

White and minority students at these schools performed equally well on the standards tests, according to the study.

Since the implementation of Everyday Mathematics, District 65 has yet to achieve similar results, Hiller said.

“These dramatic results, we’re not there yet,” Superintendent Hardy Ray Murphy said.

Minority students in the district are still not closing the gap in achieving state standards, Hiller said.

This disparity has occurred because elementary schools in the district have varied in how they applied the program, said Judith Levinson, director of research, evaluation and planning for the district. Two schools started the program one year later than expected because teachers were not prepared to teach it.

In addition, all K-5 students are in the Everyday Mathematics program. Chute and Haven middle schools offer only traditional mathematics sequences.

“In Evanston, the disconnect has happened because in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades, we did not adopt the program,” Hiller said.

This creates a problem for students and teachers, who are forced to reteach traditional methods of learning math.

When Everyday Mathematics was first introduced, teachers had difficulty with the material, said Noreen Winningham, a fifth grade teacher at Orrington Elementary School.

“It’s hard for us to make the transition into the reform program,” Winningham said. “But when we understand the program, the kids really do get better.”

At the meeting, the school board also heard a report on projected falling enrollment numbers at District 65 schools. The schools are expected to lose about 330 students by 2006.

Black students from low-income families likely will make up a large proportion of this loss, Murphy said.

“It says something about how affordable living (in Evanston) is,” he said.

The projections also show an increase in the numbers of Hispanic students at District 65 schools. About 22 percent of students who enrolled at the district’s kindergartens in the 2001-02 school year are Hispanics or other minorities, up from 16 percent the year before.