SIDNEY — Part 2 of the Sidney City School’s grade on the Ohio Report Card was presented during Monday night’s Board of Education meeting.
Brooke Gessler, SCS curriculum director, shared with the board the district’s progress, graduation and prepared for success grades.
The district received an overall “A” grade in the progress category, she said. Gifted students received a “B” grade; students with disabilities, “A” grade; and lowest 20 percent in achievement, “A” grade.
“Are these students making gains from one year to the next?” said Gessler. That’s the information shared in the progress portion of the report card.
An “A,” she said, means the student had two years of gain from one school year to the next. A “B” means one year of gain from one year to the next. A “C” means the student maintained the same status from one year to the next. A “D” or “F” means “we’re losing the students,” Gessler said.
The progress of a district is determined by the students in math and reading in grades 4-8, said Fessler. The progress address how much each student learns in a year, with the goal being at least a year’s worth of progress.
“Our teachers and administrators know this as value-added, which was a dimension added to Ohio’s accountability system in 2007,” said Gessler.
From 2007-12, districts received a distinction of above, met or below expected growth. The 2012-13 year was a change when the report card reflected a letter grade system. The calculation also expanded to include both a single year and multi-year grades.
New tests in 2014-15 school year required a recalculation so only one year of gains was used in calculating the 2015 grades, she said. In 2016, fifth- and eighth-grade science assessments and sixth-grade social studies will be used in the letter grade calculation.
“It is important to understand that even though students may not meet proficient on a test, they may still be learning, which is what progress focuses on,” said Gessler.
Districts, said Gessler, will be able to follow each individual students’s progress and performance through their school years. Using linkage reports, students are connected to teachers for there to be teacher reports. The teachers are connected to buildings to give building reports.
“This yields lots of data,” said Gessler. “We know we’re not providing enough professional opportunities to the teachers and administrators for them to know what the information means.”
Goals for the progress of the district, she said include:
• Continue to focus on standards and instructional strategies to prepare stronger learners.
• Seek ways to extend learning and deepen knowledge for our gifted students within the classroom on a more consistent level across the district to promote yearly gains.
Steps to improve, said Gessler, include:
• Explore means of tracking individual student progress in learning the standards in order to evaluate gains.
• Focus collaborative professional learning for teachers and administrators on building common assessments that allow for student gains to be determined.
• Monitor the district plan for implementation with fidelity.
The graduation grade for the district, said Gessler, is a “C” for both four year and five year graduation rates.
“The graduation calculation is lagged behind one year in order to include summer graduates,” said Gessler.
The 2015 report card represents a four-year rate for the class of 2014 and a five-year rate for the class of 2013.
Gessler said the steps to improve the graduation rate include:
• Express the importance of graduation beginning in younger grades.
• Increase student efficacy to impress upon them the belief they can and will graduate.
• Create a more proactive approach to student failures.
Current steps for improvement include amending the policy that ties attendance to automatic failure at the high school level; using intervention/enrichment (I/E) periods at the high school and staff to identify students who face failing courses and working with the students to earn a passing grade; re-evaluate summer school so it models the approach SHS staff are now taking with the I/E period.
There was no grade for the prepared for success category, said Gessler.
“Beginning in 2016, these ungraded measures will be combined to assign a letter grade,” said Gessler.
The prepared for success category attempts to address the question of whether students who graduate are prepared for college or a career. Items in the category include ACT participation, ACT remediation free, SAT participation, SAT remediation free, honors diploma, industry recognized credential, advanced placement participation, AP exam score of 3 or better, dual enrollment credit, international baccalaureate and IB exam score of 4 or better.
The remediation free scores for ACT and SAT apply if the student receives a score of 18 in English, 22 in Math and 21 in reading on the ACT test, and a critical reading score of 450, writing score of 430 or math score of 520 on the SAT test.
“It is important for students to be prepared for whatever awaits them upon graduation: employment or college. We need to prepare students and parents so that they know what options they have and what steps must be taken for the options,” said Gessler.
Steps to improve the prepared for success ranking include:
• Make certain that all students are prepared for and have the opportunity to take advanced coursework.
• Collaboration among students, parents and SCS staff to establish a four-year plan for students entering SHS.
“As a district we are headed in the right direction,” said Gessler. “We have to continue to make improvements so that we do not lose the gains we are making.
“We are making gains,” she said. “As we continue to engage in data-driven dialogue at every level from the district level to the classroom level, we will identify and prioritize areas for improvement, targeting those where we can make the biggest impact in the least amount of time.”
The district, she said, is a dynamical system which means there are many factors involved with student learning.
“How we building our capabilities internally will determine how well we can handle each challenge as it comes,” said Gessler. “We are making progress.”
