Hatboro-Horsham Celebrates High Scores From State

HORSHAM, PA--- A new system for measuring school performance, released by the Pennsylvania Department of Education, provides information on academic achievement, academic growth and academic indicators for the Hatboro-Horsham School District, the district announced in a press release.

The new reporting system - the Pennsylvania School Performance Profile (SPP) – provides detailed information in one location on the academic performance of our students, the district said.

The SPP is intentionally designed to capture more than the PSSA test scores in order to offer a more thorough assessment of individual school performance. Besides providing facts about the District’s demographic composition and enrollment size, the SPP provides an overview on each school’s specific academic performance using a single score.

The score, based on 100 points, has multiple measures of accountability to provide a comprehensive profile of each school.

That score is derived using the following indicators:

· Indicators of Academic Achievement make up 40% of the score. This includes the percent of students proficient on PSSA/Keystone Exams in Algebra I, Literature, and Biology for the 2012-2013 school year, the percentage of third-graders reading at Proficient or Advanced on the PSSA, and other competency assessments such as the SAT/ACT.

· Indicators of closing the Achievement Gap among all students make up 5% of this score.

• Indicators of closing the Achievement Gap among historically underperforming students make up 5% of this score. Students falling within this category are those receiving Special Education services, English as a Second Language Students and Economically Disadvantaged Students.
• Indicators of Academic Growth through the Pennsylvania Value-Added Assessment System (PVAAS) Growth Index make up 40% of the score. This index represents the school’s impact on the academic progress of students from year-to-year, with this year being the first since the SPP is new.
• Other academic indicators make up 10% of the score. These include graduation and promotion rates, attendance rates, Advanced Placement credits and PSAT participation. This calculation is only applied to relevant schools. For example, graduation rates would not be calculated into the formula for elementary schools.

Additional extra credit points were also awarded based on the percentage of students rated “Advanced” on PSSAs and Advanced Placement course achievements.

The following are our school’s performance profile scores:Blair Mill Elementary School – 79.6,Crooked Billet Elementary School – 91.4, Hallowell Elementary School – 84.7, PennypackElementary School – 77.7, Simmons Elementary School – 93.6, Hatboro-Horsham Senior High School – 87.4. Keith Valley Middle School’s score is not yet available due to potential coding errors with the Keystone Exams, which affect data calculations.

According to Superintendent Dr. Curtis Griffin, overall the District is pleased with the scores.

“This is a new system and one that will require a closer look at all of our schools to see what steps we need to take to maintain achievement, support continued growth, and to make improvements where they are needed,” Griffin said. “While I might not agree with the formula used by the state to create a score for each school, I do feel we can all benefit from the more complete snapshot that the SPP now provides. We encourage our parents and community to look at our school’s performance profile score and look at the specific performance results for each academic performance measure.”

According to Dr. Griffin, each of the District’s schools will be carefully evaluating the SPP data and developing an action plan based on evident strengths and growth areas. Each principal will be sharing plans with parents in their respective schools later this fall.

“I believe that this report points to many successes worthy of celebrating and it provides us with insight into where we need to do better. One specific area of success is that three of our Title I schools have received Federal Accountability Designation Rewards on the SPP; Blair Mill and Pennypack were classified as Reward schools for High Achievement and Crooked Billet was classified as a Reward school for High Progress.

According to PDE’s definition, “High Achievement” represents the highest 5% Title I schools based on aggregate proficiency in math and reading in the PSSAs and/or Algebra and Literature and test participation. “High Progress” represents the highest 5% Title I schools based on PVAAS (Pennsylvania Value-Added Assessment System) aggregate growth scores in math and reading in the PSSAs or Algebra and Literature among all students.

I look forward to working with my administrators and teachers as we navigate this new report and use it to the benefit of all of Hatboro-Horsham’s students,” said Griffin.

Data from this SPP report is available for public review at www.paschoolperformance.org .