By GABE JORDAN
gabe.jordan@gaflnews.com
CORDELE — Every elementary school in Crisp County met AYP goals for the past school year, according to reports from the state education department and the local school system.
AYP, or Annual Yearly Progress, is one of the cornerstones of the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 that measures year-to-year student achievement on statewide assessments.
“Blackshear Trail, J.S. Pate, A.S. Clark and Southwestern elementary schools are secure in AYP, and that’s something we all can be proud of,” said Dr. Michael Lehr, assistant superintendent for district services.
While the success story of the elementary schools is one local education leaders are rightfully trumpeting, they say Crisp County Middle School and Crisp County High School’s failure to make AYP is far from finalized.
Lehr said AYP is determined mainly by two indicators: The primary indicator is performance on certain standardized tests (english/language arts, reading and math), and a secondary indicator varies depending on the school level.
At the high school, that secondary indicator is the school’s graduation rate, which is in turn determined by the pass rate on the Georgia High School Graduation Test. This school year Crisp County High School did not meet the AYP requirement of a 70 percent graduation rate, but Lehr said students satisfied all primary indicators used to determine AYP.
That is an actual improvement by the high school over last year’s AYP performance, because certain student demographics did not meet the primary indicators for last year. And Lehr said re-tests on the state graduation test may lead to a final satisfaction of the secondary AYP indicator for high schools.
“You can make progress in a school over the course of the year and still not reach AYP goals,” Lehr said, “but if our graduation re-tests result in our graduation rate exceeding 70 percent, you will see the high school’s red ‘N’ turn into a green ‘Y’ on the state superintendent’s AYP list.”
Even if the re-tests don’t result in a 70+ percent graduation rate, Lehr said there is a silver lining to the high school’s AYP cloud.
“Not making AYP means more state funding will be funneled to the high school to develop innovation that will be used to address deficiencies,” he said.
At the middle school, the lack of AYP success also hinges on the secondary indicator, which at that level is determined by the school’s faculty leadership team. This year, the middle school chose performance increases over last year’s writing assessments as the secondary indicator. Unfortunately for the school’s leadership team, this year’s writing assessments dipped slightly below last year’s levels at Crisp County Middle School instead of improving.
The bright side is that students at the middle school improved their science scores this year, which means the middle school is appealing its AYP designation in hopes that the science scores, another potential secondary indicator, can be substituted for the writing assessments.
“It’s not fair to demoralize and penalize students because the school’s leadership team happened to choose the wrong secondary indicator,” Lehr said. “That’s the basis of the middle school’s appeal.”
Lehr said the state school superintendent will soon consider the middle school’s AYP appeal, but there is no timeline for a response.
