Brownwood, Bangs and Early ISDs held a joint press conference Thursday afternoon to release and discuss the Texas Education Agency’s annual ratings for the districts based on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test, completion rates and annual dropout rates.
Officials from each school district wanted to stress that ratings of schools and districts show a drop over previous years due to changes in the way the state calculated the ratings for 2011.
The lowest passing rate among all groups of students determines the ranking of the campus and/or district. The student groups are defined to be the major ethnic and racial groups as well as students designated as economically disadvantaged.
Due to the changes in the calculations of these ratings, there are significant differences between the 2010 and 2011 accountability systems, which include:
- Commended Performance: Added to the 2011 accountability system; campuses and districts are evaluated on the percent of students who score high enough (roughly 90%) on the TAKS Reading/ELA and Mathematics to achieve Commended Performance. 25% of “all students” and “economically disadvantaged” is required to reach Exemplary, 15% to reach Recognized.
- English Language Learner (ELL) Progressive Indicator: Added to the 2011 accountability system; campuses and districts are evaluated on the percent of current and monitored limited English proficient (LEP) students who meet the TAKS Reading/ELA standard or the criteria on the Texas English Language Proficiency Assessment System (TELPAS) reading component.
- TAKS Modified and TAKS Alternative: Applied for the first time; results on TAKS-M and TAKS-Alt assessment for special education students in all grades and subjects tested are included in determining the 2011 accountability ratings.
- Texas Projection measure (TPM): Discontinued for the 2011 accountability system. In 2009-2010, the TPM was used as an additional feature in the system to elevate campus and district ratings given certain conditions were met, namely students that had demonstrated growth over the past years and were on target to reach a passing measure.
“I’m going to predict tomorrow at 1:00, when the commissioner has his press conference where they release data, you are going to see that a lot of districts and campuses around the state, their ratings have either stayed the same or declined,” said Dr. Reece Blincoe, BISD Superintendent.
Blincoe expressed that schools should not be judged by these ratings alone, that Brown County schools are doing a great job in educating students although these ratings may cause concern.
“Don’t accept the commissioner or the governor or anybody else comparing this year’s ratings to when TAKS started, ten years ago,” Blincoe said. “That is a tremendously unfair comparison and I think you are going to find that in earlier press releases, that’s what they are trying to do. Hold them accountable.”
Blincoe said that school ratings need to be looked at from year to year.
Early ISD Superintendent Brett Koch said he was pleased with Early ISD’s accomplishments despite receiving lower ratings than last year.
“Year over year, Early ISD does outstanding work and we are pleased with what we accomplish year over year,” said Koch.
Bangs ISD Superintendent Bill Foster stated that students and teachers worked very hard this year to keep scores up.
“I want to stress this point to our teachers, our parents and mainly our students that worked a lot harder this year trying to keep our scores up, but due to the way the scores have changed in the way they are counted, has dropped our ratings,” said Foster.
According to a Brownwood ISD press release, the 2011 accountability ratings requirements are defined as:
- Exemplary: Minimum passing rate of 90% of all students and all sub-populations
- Recognized: Minimum passing rate of 80%
- Academically Acceptable: Minimum passing rate of 70%
The following are the 2011 ratings from the three school districts:
Brownwood ISD: Recognized
- Coggin Elementary: Recognized
- East Elementary: Academically Acceptable
- Northwest Elementary: Recognized
- Woodland Heights Elementary: Recognized
- Brownwood Intermediate: Recognized
- Brownwood Middle School: Academically Acceptable
- Brownwood High School: Recognized
Early ISD: Recognized
- Early Primary: Exemplary
- Early Elementary: Exemplary
- Early Middle School: Recognized
- Early High School: Academically Acceptable
Bangs ISD: Academically Acceptable
- J.B. Stephens Elementary: Academically Acceptable
- Bangs Middle School: Academically Acceptable
- Bangs High School: Academically Acceptable
With the phasing out of TAKS and the implementation of the state’s newest standardized test known as the State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness (STAAR) occurring during the coming school year, Texas public school districts and their individual campuses will retain current accountability ratings through 2012.
Accountability ratings will be released for all districts across the state at 1:00pm on Friday, July 29, 2011.
Pictured at top from left to right: Brett Koch, Early ISD; Bill Foster, Bangs ISD; and Reece Blincoe, Brownwood ISD.
See video of comments from school officials during the press conference below.
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{denvideo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03bMrvcacN8 400 300 }
{denvideo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDwh8C9uAD8 400 300 }
