Local school systems get better grades from state
Annual report cards meant to give parents quick ways to compare
02/26/04By CHALLEN STEPHENS
Times Staff Writer email@example.com
State Superintendent Joe Morton this morning released the annual batch of school-by-school, system-by-system report cards that boil down scores on five standardized tests into easy-to-understand letter grades.That means parents can check each school system's and each school's letter grade for, say, performance on last year's fifth-grade writing assessment. That's where Huntsville City Schools got an A-, up from a C+ last year. Madison County Schools raised a B to an A. And Madison City Schools raised an A- to an A. But that's just one small part of the yearly report cards. The report cards provide letter grades for projected dropout rates and career technical programs, and for scores on the Stanford Achievement Test, the Alabama Graduation Exam, the seventh-grade writing exam and college admission tests. "While B's might be OK in some cases, C's are not," explained Morton during a press conference this morning while reviewing some state averages. The letter grades are based on tests taken during the 2002-03 school year. The test scores were announced last year and used to determine who graduated, who got into college and which schools were placed on "academic watch" and "academic priority." The new twist is that the test scores are simplified to a letter grade by the state and then packaged along with numbers for student enrollment, attendance rates, level of education achieved by teachers, discipline accounts, computer access and more. The school report cards will be sent home with each student's personal report card. Parents can quickly compare grades among schools by logging onto the Web site of the Alabama Department of Education at . The report cards also provide letter grades for local tax support and the alternative assessment for special education students. This year grades improved most in the area of writing, as individual schools and whole systems now target the newest measure of accountability. The seventh and fifth grade writing exams help determine which schools are labeled "watch" or "priority." But grades didn't climb in all subjects. Area schools and systems actually saw declining grades for the four-year projected dropout rate. All area systems did well on the percent of kids passing the graduation exam, but it appears more students are leaving school before taking that test to earn a diploma. "Do we have a dropout problem?" asked Morton this morning. "The answer is yes." The statewide dropout rate is 14 percent, which moved the average grade for all of Alabama from a B- last year to a C+ now. Here, Buckhorn High had a C- and Sparkman High had a C for dropout rate last year. Both slid to a D+ this year. New Hope dropped from a D last year to an F. Butler, Johnson, Lee, Madison County High and Hazel Green High all saw that grade slip this year. Only three high schools in Madison County earned an A for low dropout rates. At Bob Jones High in Madison, only 1.2 percent of ninth-graders in the 2001-02 school year are expected to drop out by 2005, compared with 26.7 percent at New Hope High. In other subjects, grades are more constant. On the high school graduation exam, which students must pass to earn a diploma, all local systems and most schools passed with top grades again. Madison city and Madison County earned A's again for the number of students passing all portions of the exam - reading, language, math and science. Huntsville City Schools earned a B, matching the state average. Here systemwide grades were unchanged from last year. Throughout the county, only Butler and Johnson high schools failed to meet or pass the state's average grade of a B. Johnson earned a C and Butler earned a D for the graduation exam. That means between 80 and 84 percent of last year's seniors at Butler passed all four sections of the exam and qualified for a diploma. Between 85 and 89 percent passed at Johnson. Last year the state added a letter grade for scores on the Alabama Alternate Assessment, which is used to evaluate some special education students. This year, those grades also vary widely among systems and those schools that had enough students to qualify for a grade. Grades also vary when it comes to mills equivalent, which is calculated by dividing local tax support for education by the value of one mill of local property tax. But when it comes to vocational education, almost all local systems earned an A. That indicates the technical courses meet industry standards. And for the first time, the annual release includes letter grades for New Century Technology High School, which is Huntsville's experimental high-tech school on the campus of Calhoun Community College. New Century earned a B for the graduation exam and a C+ on the ACT, but still didn't have enough data to be graded on projected dropout rate. Elementary and middle schools are evaluated using different tests. The state first provided the reports for more than 1,400 schools in 1996. Systemwide report cards began a year earlier. Former state Superintendent Ed Richardson had said the letter grades make school systems more directly accountable to the public. Low grades invite questions from parents. And those questions create a force for improving schools. The report cards also compile data on number of computers per pupil, student attendance, number of teachers, drug and weapon suspensions and percentage of teachers working in their field of study.