Last year Pleasant Valley school board members, administrators and educators took a hard look at the problems students and teachers were having with the way math was being taught and, more importantly, the results.

So last May the district hired Paul Riccomini to work with the teachers to find new ways to reach students. Riccomini is an associate professor of education at Penn State and Clemson universities and nationally known author and educator.Now it is time to renew Riccomini's contract, and the board is split over continuing the program.At a meeting earlier this month the directors were given a glowing review of the program and its successes by elementary school Principal Erica Greer, math supervisor Shavonne Liddic and a number of other teachers who have worked with Riccomini and are actively using his strategies.The program went into effect this school year and was paid for through a State Need to Learn grant.The plan was to bring Riccomini in to work mainly with the fifth grade, but to work with other grades as well.Riccomini has worked one on one with a number of teachers. Teachers and paraprofessionals have also had access to webinars.Riccomini's approach is to give the educators strategies to teach math. The program shows teachers six strategies.The program has enthusiastic supporters at the intermediate and elementary schools, but some of the teachers surveyed were critical of the program because they felt that they were given too much in too short of a time.In response to this criticism, Liddic proposed that the program be delivered over a three-year period, with only two strategies being implemented per year. The goal is to master the techniques taught by Riccomini and then have the teachers work with each other to maintain it themselves. Under this plan Riccomini would no longer be under contract to the district at the end of three years.Directors Len Peeters and Doug Wisser oppose continuing the program, mainly citing lack of improved test scores and the criticism of the program by some of the teachers. The decision was previously tabled to allow the administration to gather information on other schools that have used the program and to attempt to get a lower cost for the program.Resident Wendy Frable directed her comments to those opposed to the continuation of the program."You have some incredible teachers who have taken their own personal time to come here tonight to share their enthusiasm for this program with you," Frable said. "And you are basing your decision on the comments made by some anonymous teachers who didn't even bother to come here and address the board. When you have staff this excited about professional development, they should be rewarded."Since the last meeting both Kenneth Newman, assistant to the superintendent, and Liddic have been in contact with Riccomini. He was willing to decrease his fees for one-on-one meetings and to include his webinars at no charge.The discount amounted to a savings of $18,000 for the next school year. The program would still be paid for out of the Need to Learn grant.When it was clear that the board would not be voting on the contract yet again, but tabling the matter for "further research" into what other districts are paying for the Riccomini's services, the frustration of several educators was obvious.Liddic said she was sure that if the district put the decision off any longer it would lose its spot on Riccomini's schedule for next year.In a last-ditch effort, high school Assistant Principal Tresa Malligo made an impassioned plea to the directors to reconsider."I taught math for 10 years," Malligo said. "Teachers teach the way they were taught. Then things changed and we handed these kids calculators and started to teach them how to take a test. So these kids get to secondary school and they can solve these complex calculus problems, but they don't know how to add, subtract, they don't know their multiplication tables."These strategies, they are going to help us to fill in the blanks, so that when these kids get to the secondary schools they are going to have so much more."Riccomini's proposal for 2016-2017 school year was $48,000.