Board members indicated their willingness last week to allow the small-school concept at East Wake more time to prove its worth. The staff will provide updated data at the board’s June 16 meeting.

Now it’s time for principals, teachers and students at East Wake to prove that trust was well-placed.

Now they’ve had two years under their belt with all four small schools in place.

School leaders have admitted to growing pains as they implemented the program at East Wake.

It’s time to put those problems in the rear view mirror, quickly address other parent and school board concerns and get on with the business of educating students.

Test scores have not been good at East Wake for a long time. As the small school program begins to take root, we expect teachers to work with students to raise those performance rates.

We expect administrators to provide targeted assistance to classroom teachers who need help. That will require school leaders to listen closely to teachers when they voice concerns and raise issues.

And it will take students and parents willing to put a little elbow grease into that age-old habit of studying.

To be sure, there will still be drop outs. There will still be students who don’t test well.

But if the small school concept is worthwhile, it’s getting to be time to show those results.

While we don’t expect East Wake students’ test scores to rocket to the top of the county list, we should begin to see significant incremental improvement year after year.

Government types are prone to writing problems off to one circumstance or another. They are also given to quitting too quickly on promising solutions.

The school board appears ready to stay the course on what looks to be a promising effort.

Now it’s time for East Wake folks to put excuses in their pockets and come up with results.

Johnny Whitfield Managing Editor