September 2007 News
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Accountability Progress Report
District Progress on NCLB Benchmarks and API Scores
The districts’ Office of Research, Evaluation, and Technology indicates that the Accountability Progress Report (APR) was released on Friday, August 31, 2007. This report includes information on how our schools did on the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) benchmarks and on the state Academic Performance Index (API) scores. In general, it gives a look into how each school performed in relation to other schools in our district, the state, and the nation.
Overall, the schools in our elementary and secondary districts compare quite favorably to the state and the nation and none of our schools missed passing all federal benchmarks schoolwide. Schools receive API scores for each numerically significant subgroup: racial/ethnic socio-economically disadvantaged, English learners, and students with disabilities. Understandably, these last three subgroups have a harder time making passing benchmarks for either the English or the math sections of the tests.
Three schools in the elementary district (Franklin, Harding, and McKinley) and two schools in the secondary district (La Cumbre Junior High and Santa Barbara Junior High) missed having at least one subgroup pass–usually English learners in English–and are labeled “Program Improvement” or “PI” schools. Additionally, three schools (Monroe, Santa Barbara Community Academy, and Goleta Valley) have a “mark” against them but are not in Program Improvement.
The elementary district is also labeled as a PI district due to English learners not making adequate progress.
On a positive note, La Cumbre Junior High passed in all subgroups last year, so its PI status was “frozen” and, if it passes again this year, La Cumbre will exit PI.
According to Dr. Davis Hayden, the districts’ director of research, evaluation, and technology, “In terms of API scores, again most schools have quite high API scores. Our lowest API score was at Cesar Chavez Charter School, but they also showed a strong growth of 25 points and managed to make all NCLB categories to stay clear of Program Improvement. Altogether, 18 of our 21 schools have an Academic Performance Index of 700 or higher and five schools– Roosevelt, Washington, Peabody Charter, Goleta Valley Junior High and La Colina Junior High–have an API of 800 or higher. [The state has set 800 as the score that schools should strive to meet.] This represents strong scores when compared to state averages.”