March 18, 2008

ISTEP results place Bluffton Middle School in students ‘academic watch’ category

Jon Bennett, principal of Bluffton Middle School, discussed Public Law 221 as pertains to ISTEP scores at the Bluffton-Harrison School Board meeting on Monday evening.

While elementary, middle school, and high school students had all managed to score a 70 plus percent overall performance rating, the middle school students were put on academic watch for not meeting average yearly progress rate (AYP).

Public Law 221 is an accountability system for K-12 education passed the Indiana General Assembly in 1999. It puts Indiana school corporations in one of five categories based upon improvement and performance data from ISTEP scores. In descending order, these categories are “exemplary performance,” “commendable performance,” “academic progress,” “academic watch,” and “academic probation.” Performance is the percentage of all students who pass the English and math ISTEP+ tests, and improvement is the percentage of students passing ISTEP+ over a three-year period.

Schools in the “academic probation” category will face interventions designed to provide support needed to improve student achievement.

Bennett passed out papers to the board that detailed these data.

Elementary students include those in third, fourth, and fifth grade (while fifth graders are in the middle school, Bennett said the state recognizes that most of their instruction prior to the test came from elementary school). They had an 80.6 percent performance rating, putting them in the “commendable” category.

“We’re excited that the performances of even our special ed and reduced lunch students at the elementary was very high,” Bennett pointed out. “So we made the AYP at the elementary in all those categories.”

While the elementary school’s improvement rating was down 2.3 percent, “The state recognizes that if you’re at a high percent passing it’s hard to maintain that, so any school that has a percent passing of 80 percent or above is automatically placed in the commendable program,” said Bennett.

Bennett added that if the special education and reduced lunch students had met their AYP, the elementary school would have been placed in the exemplary progress category.

Concerning the middle school, those students had a performance rating of 71.9 percent with a 0.2 percent improvement. But since special education students did not meet AYP for English and math and free and reduced lunch students did not meet AYP for English, the school did not meet the overall AYP.

“However, our attendance is high enough [that] if we were in Safe Harbor, we could have met AYP,” said Bennett. “If we had reduced the amount failing by ten percent, even though the numbers of total percent passing were not high enough, we could have met AYP in Safe Harbor.”

Bennett reminded the board that grades six to nine of special education students are accountable to the score.

“As the principal of the middle school, I certainly want a higher percent of my special ed students passing,” said Bennett.

Bennett said one of the strategies being used to raise their scores is have special education students track their scores in relation to the cut score.

The cut score, Bennett said, represents the passing score on ISTEP, which changes every year depending on subject and grade level, but the school wants to see where students are in comparison to that cut score.

“I’m very proud of our special ed teachers who are tracking those students,” said Bennett. “And we’ve seen some significant gains.”

Bennett added that one could not categorize all special education students in one group. “They’re as diverse as our general ed population.”

But when it came to student writing, there was work that needed to be done. “We’re making gains, but it’s all in relation to where you start,” said Bennett.

Bennett showed a pie chart taken from a PowerPoint presentation on the Indiana Department of Education’s website that said 62.4 percent of the time a school does not make the AYP because of special education students. “So we’re not unique to other school districts.”

For the high school, there were no special education or free and reduced lunch students because the high school is responsible for tenth grade ISTEP scores only since ninth grade scores reflect back on the middle school, said Bennett.

The high school’s performance was impressive. It had a performance rating of 77.8 percent with a 2.4 percent improvement.

“Since 2002, our high school tenth graders have met AYP,” Bennett pointed out on the paper. “Again, unless we get a class with a lot of special ed or free and reduced students, which I don’t ever see in one grade level, we won’t have to deal with the issue of how [those students] did.”

If the high school had been just a little bit higher, said Bennett, they would have been rated as “exemplary” instead of “commendable.”

Bennett said he did not see any concern for the three schools to get on probation because the community was strong academically with ISTEP.

“I don’t want this to be a blame on special ed and free-reduced kids though,” said Bennett. “I think that would be unfair. The key is that all students make progress.”

Later, there was discussion over the second reading of the random drug testing policy. Kent Shady wanted clarification concerning the consequences section. It said on a first offense, a student would be suspended for “25 percent of the school year.” As an example, it said a school year was 180 days, and said a student driver would be suspended from driving to school for 45 school days, or nine weeks, if tested positive.

However, the policy also said students enrolled in extracurricular activities would be suspended for 25 percent of the “school year” concerning that activity, which would not be 45 days. Steve Baker, principal of the high school, said some activities, such as academic bowl, only last 30 days, so making it a flat 45 day suspension would exempt them from 100 percent of that activity if the suspensions overlapped. So, a punishment would be 25 percent of the duration of the activities. The suspension would apply to all their activities, and each sentence would be served concurrently.

To avoid making the policy punitive, the consequences could not involve anything like expulsion, which would hamper academic performance.

Baker added that student drivers, should they test positive, would learn that “driving is a privilege, not a right.” It also keeps them from driving while under the influence or thinking about doing so.

Students could easily ride the bus to school or have their parents drive them to school

Wood said if there was any confusion during the first year, the policy could be amended.

The board unanimously approved the policy after discussion.

In other business:

–The board unanimously approved the retirement request submitted by Kathleen Seals, the high school guidance secretary, and Sue Moser, a middle school cafeteria worker.

–The resignation requests submitted by Lindsay Holmes, high school freshman cheerleading coach, and Becky Biberstein, corporation treasurer, were unanimously approved by the board.

–The board unanimously approved the employment recommendation of Joel Dollar as middle school track coach on an as-needed basis if the number of students warranted it.

–School superintendent Dr. Julie Wood asked for board permission to prepare for a reduction in force due to declining enrollment, loss in state and local support, and financial uncertainty for the upcoming school year.

–These courses and fees for summer school classes were recommended: English ($10), pre-algebra ($10), instrumental music (free), and driver’s education ($300). There was also a recommendation of summer remediation for language arts and possibly math with a maximum of four teachers for the period of July 7 through Aug. 1. These were unanimously approved by the board.

–The board unanimously approved a recommendation to accept the tax anticipation warrant bid from National City Bank with an interest rate 3.19 percent. While it is hoped they would not need to use the loan, it is necessary to have the loan should it be needed.

–The board unanimously approved permission to advertise for silent bids for gymnastics equipment, with the funds going to the athletic department.

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