Most Schools in Hartland Earn High Grades From the State

Schools in Hartland bucked a statewide trend of dropping scores by receiving nearly all 'A's on a new state report card released Monday by the state Department of Education — but a few blemishes remain.

Those achieving Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in 2009-10 were: ,, and , and elementary schools. In addition, the district as a whole earned AYP, the standard set under the federal No Child Left Behind law.

But results show two schools — and LEGACY — failed to meet AYP.

Laurie Mayes, Hartland's assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, said overall the results are good and the district is working to improve the two schools. She also noted that both faced unique challenges with their student populations in these ratings.

"It's just a very small percentage of students who are struggling and not making AYP, so we're very happy with the results," Mayes said.

Creekside

Creekside, which previously was meeting AYP, scored a B and failed to achieve standards in English language arts for students with disabilities, according to results. The rating means the school must analyze the issue and come up with a plan to address it.

Mayes said the designation likely will be one-year blip because the district already had taken steps to move students to other schools for the upcoming year, moving away from a program that centralized elementary disabled students at Creekside.

"The state encourages you to have them in their home schools," for educational reasons, Mayes said.

But she added there's another effect that's relevant to AYP — students with disabilities in smaller numbers would less likely force an AYP downgrade even if they continued to struggle.

LEGACY

LEGACY, the district's alternative high school, failed for the third year in a row and did not meet either the math or English language arts standards, results show. LEGACY stands for Let's Educate, Graduate and Care for our Youth and is housed the .

Mayes said LEGACY struggles because not enough students, some of whom have been expelled from other districts, will show up to take the required tests. The low numbers mean an automatic downgrade and that the calculation is averaged over a three-year period.

"It's very complex and nearly impossible for our alternative school to make it," she said.

Statewide

Overall, Michigan schools saw a 7.1 percentage point decrease in students making AYP, dropping from 86 percent of schools in 2009-2010 to 79 percent in 2010-2011.

Michigan high school students showed significant declines in the percentage of high schools making AYP, going from 81.9 percent last year to 60 percent this year.

Jan Ellis, spokeswoman for the education department, suggested the drop is the result of increasing proficiency target amid growing academic expectations. She said every time the state increases the target by 10 or 12 points, especially in math, there tends to be a group of students on the cusp, that when the scores increase, they just don't make it.

She said the math targets, for instance, had not increased for three years in a row, giving some students a chance to start to catch up, then they jumped significantly this past year, which put students behind again.

"We are raising the bar on what they need to know, to also raise AYP simultaneously is very, very difficult," she said.

Mayes said another factor is at work. She said the state has added more at-risk students from alternative schools or court-based programs to the numbers, which has dragged them down.

"It's a little deceiving," she said. "They added a bunch to the mix."

Common Core Standards

In addition, Ellis said the state is awaiting word on whether the federal government will give Michigan a waiver on meeting proficiency targets in the next 10 years as it works on boosting overall academic performance.

Ellis said that will allow the state to balance yearly progress with the increase in rigor in schools in Michigan are facing as the state adopts Common Core Standards.

"We want to raise the rigor of what students know, rather than lower the bar," she said.

Common Core Standards, essentially means setting specific goals for what students need to know in each subject. For instance, what exactly students should know in each grade/subject to have a clear understanding of it.

This, Ellis said, will better prepare students for college and career paths, make them reading to take the national assessment test, boost ACT scores and give a better understanding of what they are being taught.

Mayes said the shift toward this core means that all of Hartland schools — event those that passed — are looking to improve.

"We're not done at any of the buildings," she said. "There's always room for improvement."

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