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The California Department of Education's latest Academic Performance Index report lays out the testing goals for schools in the coming year, and in doing so shows a mix of strong performances and academic challenges across Lake County's districts and schools.
The report, released May 5, marked the beginning of a new reporting and testing cycle, according to State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson.
“This is the jumping-off point where, based on last year's testing results, schools are given a number of points by which they must grow in order to satisfy the requirements of our state accountability system,” Torlakson explained.
The API data can be found at www.cde.ca.gov/ta/ac/ap/index.asp.
The May 5 Base API Report includes the Base API, growth targets and school ranks, the state said. The Growth API Report, which will be released in early fall, includes the Growth API, growth achieved, and whether or not targets were met.
According to the Department of Education, it is the Growth API Report that will come out in the fall that determines whether a school met or exceeded its growth target and whether it may be identified for participation in state intervention programs designed to help a school improve its academic performance.
Tim Gill, senior director of education services for the Lake County Office of Education, said the scores used to establish the schools' goals were from tests students took from mid-April to early May of 2010.
“I believe that there is a lot of optimism in the county this year regarding the tests,” Gill said. “I'm optimistic that we're going to see some big jumps in the API across the county this year.”
He said local schools did a fantastic job of preparing students this year. Despite economic hardships and dwindling resources, “Our teachers and schools are still getting after it and working really hard.”
Gill said the Lake County Office of Education offers districts technical assistance around the entire testing system, helps schools align their curricula with testing blueprints and design tests to give reliable information on how students are doing on the standards.
“I'm kind of the interpreter of the system and I help everyone understand it,” he said, explaining that he goes through the hundreds of pages of reports to assist principals and administrators understand the information, since most local schools don't have specialists to devote to such in-depth analysis.
Gill said the testing has several “performance bands” – advanced, proficient, basic, below basic and far below basic.
In the last three to four years, local schools been doing a good job of reducing the number of students in the bottom two bands, below basic and far below basic, Gill said.
He said all of the schools have interventions in place for students who need help to improve their understanding of the core subjects.
The API has set the score of 800 and above as statewide performance target.
Based on the 2010 API scoring, several local schools have achieved that goal, including Rivera Elementary School in Kelseyville, with 805; Coyote Valley Elementary in Middletown, with 827; Middletown Middle School, with 810; and Cobb Elementary School, at 900.
Cobb Elementary has been the county's top scoring school for the last three to four years, said Gill, explaining that they're focused on standards and following the testing blueprints. Schools that pay attention to that information do well on the test.
Gill said the school also has a lot of advanced students to do so well.
Middletown Unified School District Superintendent Dr. Korby Olson noted, “Cobb is unique.”
He credited the school's “very veteran staff” with many years of hard work to implement the standards.
“We've got some outstanding teachers in the classrooms up there,” he said, adding, “We've brought some of those same things to the other schools.”
Lakeport Unified also showed strong growth amongst its schools.
“Our teachers and administrators are very proud of the academic growth our students made on the API last year because all of our district schools are getting close to achieving the statewide performance target of 800,” said Lakeport Unified Superintendent Erin Hagberg. “Their success is a result of great teaching and hardworking students.”
Understanding the rankings
The Department of Education said that a school's statewide rank is based on the school's Base API and is calculated separately for three types of schools – elementary, middle and high schools.
Ranks are established by deciles, with each decile containing 10 percent of all schools of each type. The agency said there always will be schools ranked 1 and schools ranked 10 because of the nature of the decile system.
A 10 ranking is best, down to the lowest ranking, 1. Cobb Elementary had a 9 ranking, the highest countywide.
Clear Lake High School in Lakeport, which the state recently named a distinguished school, had a base API score of 791 and was ranked 8, the highest ranking for a high school in the county.
Coyote Valley and Middletown Middle School each were ranked in the 7 decile, as was Middletown High School, with a 776 base API.
In the Konocti Unified School District, Lower Lake High had a 3 rank, the best for the district, followed by Pomo Elementary with a 2. The rest of the district's schools had 1 rankings, the lowest on the scale.
Upper Lake Elementary and Upper Lake Middle School both had 2 rankings, while Upper Lake High ranked 4, and Lucerne Elementary was ranked at 3.
In Kelseyville, Riviera Elementary was ranked 6, Mountain Vista Middle School 4, Kelseyville High 3, and Kelseyville Elementary, 2.
Besides Clear Lake High's strong 8 ranking, Lakeport Unified's schools showed mid-range scores, with Lakeport Elementary, Terrace Middle School and Lakeport Alternative all were ranked at 5.
In Lakeport, Hagberg noted, “As a district, we will continue to focus on narrowing the achievement gap in our English Learners and socioeconomically disadvantaged students.”
Schools don't have to just meet state guidelines – they also have federal performance expectations.
Olson said Minnie Cannon Elementary, which has a 1 ranking and a 2010 base API of 682, has entered program improvement under federal – not state – guidelines.
“I really like accountability. I think it's a good thing,” he said, but noted that federal accountability doesn't take into account improvement and growth.
He suggested that it's going to be impossible to meet some of the performance standards set to take effect in the next few years, and that could result in more schools following Minnie Cannon into that government-mandated performance monitoring.
The impact of the tests
Since the testing started in 1999, some critics have claimed that meeting the standards is more an issue of teaching to the test than truly improving education.
“Opponents of the testing system are correct when they say that it's a snapshot of what students can do,” said Gill. “It's one day.”
He said no one can argue that what's tested is not valuable, although he said many teachers feel like they can't do all the things they would like to do for students because of the need to focus on the specific standards.
“The standards movement has definitely raised expectations for students across the board,” he said. “What does it do for our students? I think that's harder to say.”
At the same time, Gill said that even in the face of tough economic times, when colleges and universities are cutting back on the number of slots for incoming students, the number of Lake County students accepted to universities is growing.
He said at a recent university admission reception 124 students accepted to four-year colleges and universities were honored. Gill estimated that's about 29 more than the previous year.
Is that because of the testing?
“I don't know about that,” he said, although he pointed out that when the tests began in 1999 this year's graduating seniors would have been in kindergarten.
After more than a decade of working on state standards, there's a big change on the horizon for teachers, students and schools when it comes to testing, Gill said.
“Two to three years out from today, we're going to see a big overhaul to the system again,” he said.
Gill said schools are just now starting to take a closer look at the new standards to explore the differences.
From the math side, Gill said the new standards will shift from a focus on students being procedurally proficient to having a deep understanding of the fundamental concepts of mathematics.
“It's going to be a big challenge for our schools to make this adjustment,” he said.
There will be teacher training, new textbooks written to the standards and the requirement that the tests be taken online to give instant feedback, rather than having to wait four months for test results, according to Gill.
Both Olson and Hagberg said their respective districts are looking at the standards ahead as they're working to meet the current expectations.
“We're refining what we do every day,” said Olson.
Said Hagberg, “Although I support the concept, schools do not currently have the resources to begin preparing for the shift to national core standards. I do not understand how the state or federal governments can expect districts to make that transition with the tremendous cuts that have been made to school budgets.”
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