The Kirkwood and Riverview Gardens school districts couldn't offer more contrast among area school systems. Kirkwood, in southwest St. Louis County, is a predominantly white, generally high-achieving district, with 16 percent of its 4,900 students qualifying for free or reduced lunches. Overwhelmingly black Riverview Gardens, in north county, has nearly twice as many students as Kirkwood. Nearly 79 percent of them are poor enough to qualify for free or reduced lunches, which usually correlates with academic underachievement.

On Monday, the two school districts discovered they have something in common. Both have reduced the black-white achievement gap in five of six testing categories, according to a report issued Sunday. The testing covers grades 3, 7 and 11 in communication arts and grades 4, 8 and 10 in math. Both districts reduced the gap in all categories, except 10th-grade math.

Their success is cited in the latest report on the achievement gap in 25 area public school systems. Issued annually by the St. Louis Black Leadership Roundtable, the report seeks to call attention to the gap and highlight what districts are doing to close it.

Riverview Gardens' progress is all the more remarkable given the turmoil the district faced little more than two years ago. In June 2007, the district's superintendent, Henry Williams, was ousted after being accused of misappropriating the district's money. He later was sentenced to 30 days of shock time, placed on five years of probation and ordered to reimburse more than $100,000 to the district. Rhonda M. Key and Natalie Thomas now serve as the district's co-superintendents.

Thomas says the Williams' episode "forced us to look inside and rely on our core values." Those values were the impetus for new initiatives that are making a difference.

Previously, for example, the district usually sent teachers to conferences for staff development.

"We've now focused our professional development money into schools instead of sending people away," Thomas said. "That has helped us. We've also focused on site-based leadership so that the principal isn't doing the job alone. Teachers are working with principals about instructional decisions."

In addition, Thomas said the district was focusing more intensely on measuring the reading skills of children from kindergarten through 3rd grade and intervening quickly to help lagging students come up to speed.

Finally, she said, the district was trying to make it easier for parents to get information about a child, ranging from up-to-the minute attendance reports to academic progress to class assignments. With this change, the district shows it wants to be held accountable and to develop a closer bond with parents and the community.

One other achievement that makes Thomas proud is an audit showing the district has been fiscally responsible -- a welcome finding in light of the disarray surrounding Williams' tenure.

Deborah Holmes, Kirkwood's assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, says there's nothing magical about what the district is doing to try to close the gap.

"We are looking at each child individually, identifying what's needed and delivering according to what we identify," Holmes says, adding that it helps to instill a can-do attitude in students.

"If you believe that success breeds success, it's important for students to set goals and be able to see their progress."

The Leadership Roundtable also cites Kirkwood's adoption of differentiated instruction -- using a variety of approaches to teaching, all tailored to the ways different students learn. In this model, teachers do not assume that all children grasp material in the same way.

While stressing that the 25 districts in the study still have far to go in closing the achievement gap, the Leadership Roundtable's report pointed to these trends:

•  Four districts -- Clayton, Ferguson-Florissant, Ladue and Rockwood -- showed decreases in the gap in four of six testing categories.
•  Eight districts -- Hazelwood, Lindbergh, Maplewood-Richmond Heights, Parkway, Pattonville, Ritenour, University and Webster Groves -- reported decreases in the gap in three of six categories.

In the introduction to this year's report, Lynn Beckwith Jr., endowed professor of urban education at the University of Missouri at St. Louis, wrote that the gap is a social problem, not just a problem for schools "because it starts before many children enter kindergarten." Part of the challenge, he wrote, is to "emphasize the importance that parents play in the early years of their child's education and the significant difference parents can make in preparing their children for school."