Jefferson City Public Schools saw a nearly 6 percentage point increase of this year's Annual Performance Report (APR), maintaining its accreditation.
JCPS received 106.5 of 140 points possible, earning the district a 76.1 percent score. Last year, the district narrowly achieved the fully accredited mark with a 70.7 percent score - the cutoff for accreditation is 70 percent.
"We feel like we're heading in the right direction," Superintendent Larry Linthacum said. "We've got to keep getting better. The plan is the same. I want to give kudos to teachers and principals, but we've got to keep improving. We're working on our workplace culture and student behavior, and we want to ensure learning takes place."
The Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) releases the APR primarily to determine how public school districts and charter schools are performing. The accreditation measure considers five categories: academic achievement, subgroup achievement, college and career readiness, attendance and graduation rates.
For all five categories, DESE gives districts three types of points for each category. They reward districts for making progress by averaging the districts' scores over two years. They average scores over three years to determine the districts' "status" in each category, and they assign points for growth based on projected student achievement compared to actual student achievement.
The consensus is that JCPS is working to improve every aspect outlined in the APR - and while the district has made gains in several areas, the APR results don't always reflect that growth.
Academic achievement and subgroup achievement
Academic achievement and subgroup achievement categories are gleaned from Missouri's standardized test results. Subgroup achievement includes students who participate in the free and reduced price lunch, racial or ethnic background, English language learners and students with disabilities.
JCPS saw some gains and losses with those two academic groups. The district received 38 of 56 points for academic achievement and seven of 14 points for subgroup achievement.
In academic achievement, the district earned six more points than last year in English language arts (ELA) and five more points for social studies, but also had a three-point dip in science test scores.
Linthacum said English language arts and math have been focus areas this year, and he credited teachers and building principals for the noticeable jump in the ELA score.
As for science, Linthacum confirmed that fewer students scored proficient and advanced on the 2016 test. He noted the state average went down 5 percentage points while JCPS dipped only 1.6 percentage points in science.
Only fifth-grade, eighth-grade and high school biology students take the science test, so it's not a complete picture of student achievement in science.
"We're closing the gap with the state average, but we want the state average to be the minimum, not the benchmark," Linthacum said.
As for subgroup achievement, he said providing more differentiated learning is key to the success of those students, something the district may need to work on.
"We're trying to meet kids where they are in those subgroups and provide options for them," he said. "I think we're making headway through subgroups, and I feel like behavioral-wise that has affected the learning environment at school."
A new computer program called i-Ready will be a key tool for academic improvement for students, said Dawn Berhorst, JCPS director of student information, planning and assessment.
The program will be used throughout the year to see where students are in their knowledge of the content areas. The test results reveal detailed data on students' strengths and weaknesses and provide instructional tools for teachers, Berhorst said.
College and
career readiness
College and career readiness includes scores for the ACT and COMPASS college preparatory tests; the military ASVAB test; Advanced Placement and dual-credit tests; and post-secondary placement, which includes two- and four-year colleges, the military and entering the competitive workforce.
JCPS earned 25.5 of 30 points in college and career readiness, with gains in the testing categories - ACT, COMPASS, ASVAB, AP and dual-credit - but went down slightly in post-secondary placement.
Linthacum said those improvements stem back to focusing on the learning process and teaching material in a way that makes academics relevant to real-world scenarios.
Berhorst said the district made efforts at the secondary level to make sure all students have the opportunity to take college and career readiness-type tests. Last year was also the first year all juniors were required to take the ACT.
To bolster ACT test scores, the district is offering more opportunities to prepare for the test, including sessions with teachers trained in the area.
The dip in the post-secondary placement category can be misleading, Berhorst said. All districts follow up with the recent graduating class 180 days after graduation, and not all students respond to the request. Districts also get fewer points if students are in a field that doesn't relate to their focus area in school.
For example, if a student was part of the auto-body program at Nichols Career Center, then majored in English at a four-year university, the district receives fewer points than if that student had continued in the auto-body sector, Linthacum said.
Berhorst also noted that, considering JCPS had 57 more graduates, the drop for post-secondary placement wasn't very substantial, she said. The district's APR score for that category went from 9.5 to 7.5.
Attendance and
graduation rates
These categories are a little wonky with how they're interpreted.
Instead of evaluating a district's raw attendance data, DESE scores on a 90-90 basis - are 90 percent of students attending school 90 percent of the time?
Graduation rates aren't straightforward either. Districts receive points based on their four-, five-, six- and seven-year graduation rates. The idea is that DESE wants all students to graduate high school, even if they don't do it in four years.
JCPS received 7.5 of 10 points for attendance and 28.5 of 30 points for its graduation rate. Linthacum said the district has seen improvement in those categories but is working to better them.
The attendance rate jumped from 85.5 percent in 2015 to 86.9 percent in 2016 - meaning 86.9 percent of the student population is attending school 90 percent of the time, Linthacum said.
"I think that's a tribute to the principals and teachers, and we want to keep improving that," he said. "We're having a 'greatest attendance' contest this year that awards the greatest attendance for the month and also the greatest attendance compared to a year ago. It's a continuous effort. We're going to work until we have every kid here every day."
Increasing the graduation rate is also a long-term priority for the district, watermarked on its strategic plan as a constant reminder to improve the figure. The district went from 81 percent to 85.5 percent in 2016 for its four-year graduation rate.
Berhorst said, while there was improvement on that front, it wasn't enough of a jump to receive additional progress or growth points, which explains the slight decline.