State change increases number of low-performing schools
Changes made by North Carolina state legislators in defining low-performing schools have doubled the number of Wake County schools receiving that designation this year.
Families at 20 Wake County schools received letters this week notifying them their schools have been identified as low-performing and that plans will be developed to try to improve their performance. Schools are now considered low-performing if they receive a D or F school performance grade and didn’t exceed academic growth expectations on state exams.
Lexie Serrano, the PTA president at Poe Elementary School in Raleigh, said she was surprised to find out this week that her school is now considered low-performing. Poe would not have been considered as low-performing under a previous definition because students met growth expectations. But the new definition requiring schools to exceed growth targets tripped up several Wake schools.
“I think it’s sad that the school is getting a stigma,” Serrano said. “I’m worried that maybe this will cause some of our magnet families not to want to come here.”
Only 10 Wake schools would have been labeled low-performing this year under the previous state definition, which covered schools where a majority of students didn’t pass state exams and didn’t meet growth expectations. But the General Assembly inserted the new definition into the budget adopted in September, resulting in more North Carolina public schools being labeled as low-performing.
Supporters of the change say it streamlines the process of identifying low-performing schools, but critics say it labels schools using a flawed measurement system.
“This has done nothing but stigmatize our school staffs and our students that attend these schools,” Wake County school board Vice Chairman Tom Benton said at this week’s board meeting. “I would challenge the state to answer, if their purpose was not to stigmatize, why was not one cent of money put into the budget to offer additional resources?”
But Wake school board member Keith Sutton says the changes are raising awareness about the challenges those schools face. Most of the 581 schools statewide now labeled as low-performing have high concentrations of students receiving federally subsidized lunches and large minority populations.
“Inspite of the legislation, I think it still calls some attention and raises a call to action that we’ve got to address,” Sutton said at the board meeting.
Much of the acrimony about the change centers on using the state’s A-F letter grades to determine which schools are labeled low-performing.
Each school's letter grade is calculated from student testing scores, which account for 80 percent of the letter grade, and the measured growth of students. The growth component – which tracks improvement of students – makes up 20 percent of each school's grade.
Results for the last two years show a high correlation between students’ family income and school letter grades.
School districts around the state are attempting this month to notify parents and adoptState change increases number of low-performing schools | News & Observer:
