Several St. Louis school districts struggled with the state’s new accreditation standards, according to the Missouri School Improvement Program (MSIP) 5 results released Friday.
Out of 140 possible points, St. Louis Public Schools garnered 24.6 percent of the points, Normandy Schools 11.1 percent and Riverview Gardens Schools 28.6 percent. These districts – all which have majority African-American student populations – scored among the lowest in the state. Some charter schools also landed in the bottom tier, including Construction Careers Center (16.1 percent) and Confluence Academies (28.3 percent).
School districts must earn at least 50 percent of the points to be provisionally accredited, under the new Annual Performance Report (APR) accreditation levels. For full accreditation, districts must earn at least 70 percent.
“We came in knowing that this would not be an easy task,” said Ty McNichols, the new superintendent of Normandy School District, which scored the lowest in the state. “It just reaffirmed what we knew we had to do.”
The 24-point score is a big blow for St. Louis Public Schools – a district that just earned its provisional status last year after being unaccredited since 2007.
The new standards show that SLPS is far from meeting the provisional accreditation mark, but the state will not be yanking away its classification this year. The state will look at three years of data under MSIP5 before making a decision on any district’s accreditation. And this is the first year Missouri’s school districts have been assessed under MSIP5.
What and who we teach
What does it mean when a school district scores an 11 percent on the Annual Performance Report? Like a student’s GPA, school districts are assessed on different subjects, and the total makes up a district’s APR score.
Those subjects include attendance, graduation rate, the state’s standardized test scores, college readiness and subgroup achievement (for example, minority students, children who receive free/reduced price lunch, English language learners and students with disabilities).
However, unlike a GPA, an APR score calculates how much the districts have progressed – not just how well they scored on the standardized tests.
The new standards are more rigorous than ever, said Art McCoy, superintendent of Ferguson-Florissant School District. One big difference this year is how the subgroup category is graded. Minority students’ academic growth carries more weight than it did before – 14 points out of 140, he said.
“I was thrilled to see the subgroup achievement become a larger part,” said McCoy, who sat on the committee for MSIP5. “That makes it more important for every school district to provide an equitable education service.”
However, for school districts such as Normandy, the entire district’s population falls in one or more subgroups. That means Normandy and other districts with majority low-income, minority students are graded more heavily on these 14 points than Brentwood, for instance, that has about a 30 percent subgroup population. Brentwood earned all 14 points. In Ferguson-Florissant’s case, over 90 percent of the district falls into a subgroup, McCoy said, and it earned five subgroup points.
“For minority districts, it becomes even more pressing to meet that mark,” McCoy said. “We are judged not just on how we teach but who we teach.”
Top and bottom 10
Last week, Chris Nicastro, commissioner of the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE), said the data show that the achievement gap is widening for minorities, particularly African-American students.
However, McCoy disagrees. He believes that African Americans’ performance remained at the same level, but the standards got higher. DESE changed its standards because it wants Missouri to be among the top 10 states for student achievement by 2020.
However, Missouri remains in the Top 10 list of states that have the lowest funding for public education.
“To have the goal of being in the Top 10 while being in the bottom 10 for funding is really a difficult charge,” McCoy said. “But I believe we can succeed.”
Like many districts, Ferguson-Florissant only receives 92 percent of the state’s funding formula. The district has to raise funds from businesses to defer costs away from students, such as activity fees, he said.
Currently Ferguson-Florissant and University City school districts are fully accredited; however, their recent scores fell just below the accreditation level. Ferguson-Florissant scored 69.3 percent and University City 66.8 percent. Jennings School District is currently provisionally accredited, and its score remains at that level with 65.7 percent. These districts all have majority African-American student populations.
Hazelwood School District was only seven points away from being classified as a district “accredited with distinction,” scoring 85.4 percent. Hazelwood has a 72 percent African-American population, and 52 percent of its students are eligible for free or reduced lunch.
“What it says to me is that if we can do it, others can do it,” said Grayling Tobias, superintendent of Hazelwood schools. “If our students are succeeding, then it’s possible.”
Still, even Hazelwood struggled with earning its subgroup points. It garnered nine out of the 14 points. And those five points they missed could have helped bump the district to pass districts with lower subgroup populations, such as St. Charles.
New mandatory tests
Many of these districts also took a hard hit on their social studies scores. Previously, social studies and science were considered bonus points on the APR score, not mandatory categories as they are now. Also, the state did not pay for these MAP tests. School districts had to pay for the bonus tests themselves, if they could afford them.
Hazelwood scored 94 percent on English, and 100 percent in both mathematics and science. However, the district scored 18.8 percent on social studies. Again, this score is based on how much students grew in each subject.
St. Louis Public Schools failed to progress in any of the academic categories, but performed worst in social studies.
School by school
SLPS Superintendent Kelvin Adams said he was disappointed and concerned at the district’s 24.6 percent overall APR score.
“The scores from a district perspective look bleak,” he said. “However, there’s overall growth, and some schools are very close to being accredited.”
This is the first time DESE provided information on each building’s accreditation status.
Looking at individuals schools, seven SLPS schools – Metro, McKinley, Bryan Hill, Buder, Kennard, Mallinckrodt and Wilkinson Early Childhood Center – earned enough points to be accredited with distinction, which means earning at least 90 percent of the total possible points.
However, about five schools scored less than 10 percent, including Vashon High School, which scored zero points. Adams cautioned that this does not mean every student scored a zero on the standardized test.
Vashon had made substantial progress under the previous state requirements, which only looked at Algebra 1, he said. And previously, the state did not pay for high school MAP tests in U.S. History, Algebra II and Geometry because they were bonus points. Now they are considered mandatory, and that’s one area Vashon ran into trouble.
“Mind you, this is a school that U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan visited two years ago for the growth they’ve had in MSIP 4,” he said. “The standards are different from then.”
Of course, the scores are unacceptable, Adams said. And that’s why Adams decided to personally take on the responsibility of leading the 18 most struggling schools himself.
Previously, these schools’ principals reported to an associate superintendent regarding progress and requests for support. Now those principals will report directly to Adams.
“You have to look at the whole piece, not just a score on paper,” Adams said. “It’s easier to jump to a score and see 24 and say, ‘Wow, the district is failing.’ In this assessment, we have struggled with MSIP5. The district will not struggle next year with MSIP5.”