Schools

Schools high achieving, but fail to meet federal standards

State scores up from last year, but federal targets harder to meet.

According to state reports released yesterday, the Ross Valley schools are among some of the highest performing in the state, though there's still room for improvement.

In the Academic Performance Index (API), a number between 200 and 1,000 assigned to a school based on its performance on state standardized tests and the California High School Exit Exam, all of the Ross Valley School District schools achieved 2010 APIs over 900. Drake had an API of 852.

Among the Ross Valley schools, Brookside was the highest achieving, up from 893 last year to 931 this year – a large improvement. Wade Thomas was next, dropping 2 points from 930 last year to 928 this year. Despite the fact that middle schools traditionally struggle more than elementary schools on these types of standards, White Hill outperformed Manor with an API up to 919 from 898 last year – a jump of 21 points. Manor was still over the 900-point mark at 901, up from 891 last year.

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However, despite far surpassing the state target of an 800 API, the Ross Valley School District failed to meet the federal Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) standards. AYP looks at student participation in state-mandated tests – so that no underperforming subgroup of students can be forced to sit out the tests, the percent of students proficient in math and English overall and in each subgroup of students – so no one group is ignored, the overall API, and the graduation rates.

Despite exemplary performance overall, the Ross Valley School District failed to meet the targets for students with disabilities. The goal was for 56.8 percent of all students in every subgroup to be proficient in English and 58 percent in math. In every subgroup – including minority subgroups, socio-economically disadvantaged students, English-language learners – students met those proficiency targets, except for the students with disabilities. Only 54.4 percent of students with disabilities in the district are proficient in English and only 55.3 percent in math.

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Brookside also failed to meet the AYP targets on its own, with only 52.7 percent of its students with disabilities meeting proficiency standards in English.

Tamalpais Union District – covering Drake, Tam, Redwood, Tamiscal alternative school, and the San Andreas continuation school – met the AYP federal targets, despite having lower API scores than the Ross Valley schools.

Drake High School had the lowest API score among the traditional schools in the high school district with an 852 API, up one point from 851 the year before. Tam came in at 866, down from 868 last year, and Redwood has a 880 API, down from 884 last year.

See the full results here.


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