Oregon seeks OK to judge schools on overall performance, not success with small groups that typically struggle | OregonLive.com

Oregon seeks OK to judge schools on overall performance, not success with small groups that typically struggle | OregonLive.com:

Oregon seeks OK to judge schools on overall performance, not success with small groups that typically struggle

Published: Sunday, January 08, 2012, 3:00 PM Updated: Sunday, January 08, 2012, 5:14 PM

Oregon schools that serve a concentration of low-income students will face a distinctly different accountability system this fall if the U.S. Department of Educationapproves the state's plan.

Under the federal No Child Left Behind law, Oregon schools that receive federal funds to help disadvantaged students have been judged since 2003 mainly by whether they got enough low-income, special education, minority or limited-English students to pass state reading and math tests.

Schools that didn't -- more than 80 in 2011 -- faced a series of escalating consequences, such as having to offer students a transfer to another school or free private tutoring.

Now Oregon, like many other states, proposes to scrap that system for one that measures success