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Dayton schools score another 'D' on state report card

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By Anthony Gottschlich, Staff Writer Updated 1:13 AM Tuesday, August 25, 2009

DAYTON — Dayton Public Schools earned an academic watch ranking on the state report cards that will be released today, Aug. 25, district officials said.

While that’s the same ranking as last year, the equivalent of a D on a student’s report card, the district exceeded the state’s expectations for academic growth. The above-average ranking on so-called “value-added progress,” which measures student performance from one year to the next, follows two consecutive years of a below-average score.

“That’s the best indicator we are moving in the right direction,” Superintendent Kurt Stanic said.

The state uses a variety of performance measures, including attendance, graduation rates and the percentage of students passing state tests, to place schools and districts into one of these categories for academic achievement:

• Excellent with distinction

• Excellent

• Effective

• Continuous improvement

• Academic watch

• Academic emergency

How Dayton’s performance in 2008-09 compares to other districts won’t be known until the Ohio Department of Education releases statewide data this morning.

Stanic said the district still has a long way to go.

“We weren’t looking for dramatic change,” he said. “We were looking for solid, incremental change that will last a long period of time.”

The district of 14,500 students has received an Academic Watch ranking on the annual state report card for the past three years in a row, just one notch above academic emergency, the state’s lowest score for a district or school building’s academic performance.

But scores on the 2008-09 school year by the Ohio Department of Education give district leaders some hope. More schools are meeting or exceeding the state’s expectations for academic growth than last year.

Jane McGee-Rafal, the district’s chief academic officer, said three-quarters of the district’s elementary schools achieved at least one year’s academic growth last year. Just six scored below average, compared to 17 the previous year.

“That clearly indicates we were doing something right last year,” McGee-Rafal said.

Among the report card’s highlights:

Stivers School for the Arts for grades seven through 12 earned an “effective” ranking, the best in the district. But that’s one rung below its excellent rating last year, a slip officials attribute in part to an increased enrollment of special education students.
High schools showed the biggest gains last year, improving in all 10 academic indicators on the Ohio Graduation Test. Dunbar moved into continuous improvement from academic watch.
Of the state’s 30 performance indicators, which include test scores in reading, math, writing, science and social studies, plus attendance and graduation rates, the district met the state standard 75-percent passage rate on just two — 10th- and 11th-grade writing.
The overall attendance rate was 91.3 percent, a half percent better than 2007-08, but short of the state standard 93 percent
The 83.1 percent graduation rate bested the previous year’s rate of 82.8, marking the fifth consecutive year the district has improved on that score. The state requirement is 90 percent.
Elementary schools continue to struggle, with all but three — the boys and girls academies and Valerie — falling below continuous improvement. But on the value-added score that measures year-to-year growth, just six fell below average, down from 17 the prior year.

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