mark.andrews@daily-tribune.com
The Bartow County School System as a whole fell short this year of making Adequate Yearly Progress, but Cartersville City Schools met AYP and 11 Bartow schools met the standard.
The Georgia Department of Education made available Wednesday final AYP results for schools and school systems across the state, and in order for a system to make AYP, the system must meet 95 percent of the required criteria.
The department explained, "AYP is the formula used to determine if schools are meeting expectations under the federal No Child Left Behind Act. It consists of three parts -- test participation, academic achievement and another statistic, called a 'second indicator.' All students at a school, as well as any qualifying subgroup of students, must meet goals in all three categories in order to 'make AYP.' Schools that do not make AYP for two consecutive years in the same subject are placed in 'Needs Improvement' status and face escalating consequences."
"We're very pleased that we made AYP, we had anticipated we would following the summer [graduation] testing. Our preliminary information was validated by the state providing information that we did make [AYP]. I'm very proud of the faculty and the administration at the high school for their hard work," Cartersville Superintendent Howard Hinesley said. "We actually had some real intensive efforts made this summer through tutorials and other initiatives to do everything we possibly can so our students can be successful, and as a result of this success, it means the high school made AYP."
Bartow County Superintendent John Harper was out of town Wednesday but said he would comment on the system's results at a later time.
Of the 19 schools in Bartow, the following 11 schools met AYP: Adairsville Elementary School, Allatoona Elementary School, Clear Creek Elementary School, Cloverleaf Elementary School, Emerson Elementary School, Kingston Elementary School, Mission Road Elementary School, Pine Log Elementary School, South Central Middle School, Taylorsville Elementary School and White Elementary School.
The following eight did not meet AYP: Adairsville High School, Adairsville Middle School, Cass High School, Cass Middle School, Euharlee Elementary School, Hamilton Crossing Elementary School, Woodland High School and Woodland Middle School.
Last year 13 schools in Bartow met the standard. Cartersville saw an improvement over last year when the system fell short of the standard due to both the elementary school and high school.
Adairsville High did not meet due to second indicator; Adairsville Middle did not meet due to academic performance; Cass High did not meet due to academic performance and second indicator; Cass Middle did not meet due to academic performance; Euharlee Elementary did not meet due to academic performance; Hamilton Crossing did not meet due to academic performance; Woodland High did not meet due to second indicator; Woodland Middle did not meet due to academic performance and second indicator.
Cass High is in the Needs Improvement category and must offer both public school choice and supplemental education services like tutoring. Woodland Middle also is in Needs Improvement status and the school must offer either Public School Choice, which would provide parents the option to send their child to a different school, or supplemental education services like tutoring. This will be decided upon at a later date.
Adequate Yearly Progress is part of the No Child Left Behind initiative, which has come under fire due to allegations the set of standards places too high of an emphasis on standardized testing and has been named by some as a factor in the Atlanta cheating scandal.
State Superintendent John Barge and Sen. Johnny Isakson last month requested permission to replace NCLB with Georgia's College and Career Ready Performance Index in each public school across the state for the 2011-2012 school year. The index will measure the extent to which a school, school district and the state are successfully making progress on various accountability indicators such as content mastery, student attendance and the next level of preparation.
According to a release from GaDOE, "The implementation of the CCRPI will yield an in-depth analysis of students' college and career readiness, which is not currently provided by data collected for Adequate Yearly Progress. Separate scores will be provided in three areas to capture the essential work of individual schools: Achievement Score based upon current year data; Progress Score based upon current and prior year data; and Achievement Gap Closure Score based upon gap closure at the state or school level. The school-wide scores in these three areas will be weighted to produce the school's Overall CCRPI Score."
For more detail on individual school results, visit www.gadoe.org and follow the instructions for finding AYP scores.
At a glance: AYP and Georgia
* Number of schools making AYP that did not make AYP in the prior year: 179
* Number of school systems with 100 percent of schools making AYP this year: 49
* Number of schools coming off Needs Improvement: 31