North Texas School Makes Rap Videos To Motivate Kids

Test scores rebound at Fort Worth school after creative videos are made.

When you walk into Sunrise McMillan Elementary School, you’re met with a massage. Words of encouragement are seen from the outside of the school to the insides of the classrooms.

In those same classrooms, if you listen hard enough, you’ll hear the birth of dreams.

“I want to be a doctor,” fifth grade student, Jacelyn Miles said.

“I want to be a prosecuting attorney.” fifth grade student, Pareece Morehouse said.

All that ambition wasn’t always the case though.

“I used to feel nervous ,” Morehouse said.

“I felt afraid. I felt like I wasn’t going to pass,” fifth grade student, Ameerah Muhammad said.

Test scores were low several years ago prompting the Texas Education Agency to threaten stepping in.

“I think it was more like ‘oh it’s test time.’ Same old year. Same old things we have to do,” Morehouse said.

The change came in something in the form of a group called M.I.L.K.

“Each letter stands for ‘Mathematically Intelligent Little Kids.,’” Morehouse said.

The group was formed thanks to a creative teacher, Thomas Mayfield.

“Mr. Mayfield, he started making these videos for us,” Morehouse explained. “It kind of gave me hope.”

The students made a series of rap videos about STAAR testing which took off with the students and test scores rose in a year’s time. Other schools now want to learn this equation of motivation.

“It’s giving other people hope and chances to be confident themselves,” Morehouse said. “We are making a difference.”

It’s quite a lesson for these students living in the Stop Six community of Fort Worth. It’s an area that faces a number of challenges. But, students said they are not defined by the challenges of their surroundings.

“Just because I live in whatever neighborhood, I can still be smart,” Morehouse said confidently.

Her teacher, Mr. Mayfield, understands those challenges. This area isn’t different from the area where he grew up.

“Single parent homes. We have a lot of transient students,” Mayfield said. “Transient meaning they are in one housing unit and they may be in another housing unit a month or two later.”

With struggles sometimes high in the area, teachers and students said self-worth has to be even higher.

“A group [like M.I.L.K] doesn’t make you have confidence. It’s within yourself and the values that you have with you,” Morehouse said.