SALISBURY — Five of the Rowan-Salisbury School System’s 35 schools met Adequate Yearly Progress, the reading and mathematics accountability standard required under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
That’s down from 18 schools that met the standard last year, but district officials say the results can’t be compared because tougher performance standards put in place this year led to fewer schools meeting the goals.
“This is a transitional year and therefore, the AYP results cannot be compared with results from previous years,” Rowan-Salisbury Superintendent Dr. Judy Grissom said in a press release.
The Rowan-Salisbury schools that met AYP this year are Enochville, Faith and Millbridge elementary and Jesse Carson High and Rowan County Early College.
The preliminary results were released by the N.C. Department of Public Instruction this morning.
Millbridge will now exit School Improvement status. The school will no longer have to offer supplemental educational services and school choice, which allows students to transfer to another school.
If a Title I school does not make AYP in the same subject for two consecutive years, the school enters School Improvement status. All Rowan-Salisbury elementary schools are Title I schools.
No schools in the Kannapolis City school district made AYP.
AYP is often referred to as the “all or nothing” measure because it requires 100 percent of a school’s subgroups to reach required performance goals in reading and math. Subgroups include the school as a whole, racial categories, economically disadvantaged students, students with limited English proficiency and children with disabilities.
Schools with diverse populations have more subgroups and therefore must meet a higher number of AYP goals.
Eighteen Rowan-Salisbury schools and six out of eight schools in Kannapolis met AYP last year
School officials say this year’s decrease is the result of stricter performance standards. The percentage of students in each subgroup who must pass end-of-grade tests in order for the school to make AYP has increased.
“Our district continues to struggle, along with most other school systems, in meeting targets for certain sub-groups,” Grissom said. “In spite of these challenges, the Rowan-Salisbury School System is committed to doing whatever it takes to make sure our students perform to the best of their abilities.”
Kannapolis Superintendent Dr. Pam Cain said she’s pleased with the higher standards.
“We have set the bar high for ourselves in Kannapolis City Schools,” she said. “One of our strategic goals is to have at least 90 percent of our students at grade level by 2015; that’s even higher than these new AYP targets.”
Read the complete story in Friday’s Post.