The New Hampshire Department of Education has released this year’s list of schools that have tentatively been identified as in need of improvement.
These schools have failed to meet No Child Left Behind testing standards two years in a row.
New Hampshire Public Radio’s Dan Gorenstein reports.
LIST OF SCHOOLS
Beech Street and Wilson, Manchester; Amherst Street and Mt. Pleasant, Nashua; Russell Elementary, Rumney; Woodland Heights, Laconia; Valley View, Farmington; Paul Elementary, Wakefield; Seabrook Elementary; Winchester Elementary; Hillsboro-Deering Elementary
At the Department of Education press conference, Commissioner Nick Donohue wanted to make one thing clear.
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:12 identification as in need of improvement is not equated with failing.
While No Child Left Behind relies heavily on standardized testing to evaluate performance, Donohue says it’s important to scrutinize the data.
The school could be on the list because across the board, its test scores in math, reading, or language arts failed to meet federal standards.
What’s more likely, however, is that a few of the school’s sub-groups failed to meet standard.
For NCLB’s purposes sub-groups include racial and ethnic groups, socio-economic status, English language learners, and special education students.
Donohue says some of the 11 schools in fact are showing incredible signs of progress.
... To call a school that is exceeding state improvements across the board failing b/c they have one-sub population that leaves them identified as in-need of improvement is contrary to the intent of the law, contrary to the President’s message, and contrary to the spirit we want to implement this.
The Department said it will release final test results by mid-September.
Tracy Pelky, a parent in Winchester first heard her Elementary school was on the list early this morning.
Her initial reaction was shock, concern and confusion.
Pelky says with the town beginning to send students to Keene for high school, and accreditation problems, this latest news is troubling.
9:37 my children’s education is the most important thing in this world to me. Now, I’m looking at my hometown and their school systems and they are going all downhill. I don’t want to uproot, but I will if I have to.
Another Winchester resident Jeanie Snow, also confessed to not really understanding what being on the list meant.
But she is confident, whatever the problem, the school can improve.
:00 Being on this list doesn’t mean that we are doing something wrong, or the teachers are doing something wrong. It means that we need to step back and look at it and see what we need to do differently. To get off this list. How have we gotten to where we have gotten? What have we done wrong?
What does it mean for the school if it is put on the list?
The implications for making the list are varied.
First year schools, of which there are five this year, must offer parents choice to send their children to other schools, if there is more than one school in that district.
For schools that are on the list for the second year, they must set aside 20% of their Title 1 federal funding and use it for tutoring and supplemental services.
Schools become eligible for federal funding and can receive some technical assistance from the Department of Education.
Brent Walker is the principal of Haverill Cooperative Middle School.
His school has just been removed from the in need of improvement label.
He says the administration needed to do more than just change the way they worked with students.
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3:26 it wasn’t just educating your parents, it was educating your staff, you had to educate the other stakeholders in the school, your board...and so what we found was making a consistent topic of conversation whenever we had an opportunity to meet with parents and give them the basic message that this is about identifying areas of improvement and working on them.
The schools have 30 days to appeal the decision.
A final list is expected out in the coming weeks.
For NHPR News, I’m DG.
