Nearly half of Mat-Su schools made the mark

MAT-SU -- Seventeen of the 35 school sites in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School Board meet the Adequate Yearly Progress, or AYP, criteria for the 2002-2003 school year, according to a report released last week. The report measured 31 academic indicators to determine whether a school is meeting the standards for adequacy detailed in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001.

While 18 schools did not meet all of the AYP criteria, district public information specialist Kim Floyd and district superintendent Bob Doyle stress that it does not mean those schools are doomed for failure.

"We want to stress that those schools did not meet all of the requirements [for AYP], not that those schools failed," said Floyd. "But there wont be any excuses, these are our results."

AYP is mandated by NCLB and all public schools, regardless of size, are required to participate. The criteria in Alaska are measured by the Benchmark Exam, the High School Qualification Exam and the Terra Nova. A school must meet all 31 criteria to meet AYP requirements.

Thirty of the schools in the district meet the AYP criteria for the school as a whole, but some missed the mark once the students were broken down into different categories, such as ethnic background, students with limited English proficiency, students with disabilities and students who are economically disadvantaged. Most of the schools that did not meet the AYP requirements fell short in only one or two categories.

Schools meet AYP if they tested at least 95 percent of their students in each category, and if all students in each category meet the annual measurable objective in both language arts and mathematics. Percentages from categories with less than 20 students are not applicable for AYP; this is done to protect individual student scores from standing out. For the 2002-2003 school year, 64.03 percent of the students had to be proficient in language arts, 54.86 percent had to be proficient in mathematics. The percentage will increase steadily until the 2013-2014 school year, at which point schools will be required to be 100 percent proficient in each subject to meet AYP. While the incentive is out there to improve the scores, Floyd and Doyle both emphasize that in this school district, that will not be the number one priority.

"This is not about improving test scores," said Floyd. "This is about improving student learning."

"If I see an improvement, I will be extremely happy, no matter what," Doyle said. One example he gave is that while students with disabilities continue to take the same exams as other students, that category may not always meet the AYP requirements. But Doyle said if he sees the proficiency percentage go up each year from the following year, he will consider that a major improvement, regardless.

'It's a snapshot in time, its how we use it that makes it important," he said. The state government has plans for more appropriate tests for such students on the drawing board, Doyle said. The district is reviewing the AYP report for individual schools and will apply the knowledge drawn from the reports to improve teaching methods.