Canby Herald Online

The grades are in for Canby schools

Two Canby schools earn top grades on state report cards

• By: Peggy Savage  
• Published: 11/18/2009 11:34:22 AM
• Last Updated: 11/18/2009 8:49:35 PM

Two Canby schools earned “outstanding” grades on the state’s latest batch of report cards, with the rest of the district’s schools getting satisfactory marks.

According to the figures released by State Schools Superintendent Susan Castillo  Tuesday, Carus and Eccles elementary schools rated outstanding scores, the highest grade on the state report card. A school must achieve a score of 90 percent or higher in the achievement area to be considered outstanding. Eccles scored 97.2 percent and Carus, 91.5 percent.

The other seven schools, all included in the district’s "satisfactory" grade, received a score between 60 and 89.9 percent.

Superintendent Jeff Rose said that of the seven, Lee Elementary School, with a score of 89.9 percent, missed the outstanding rating by one-tenth of 1 percent. “So they were almost there,” he said.

Charts in the state report show the district’s scores compared to state averages, where in general, Canby schools were on a level with the state averages in reading, math, writing and science. All Canby schools scored outstanding in the areas of attendance and participation.

“If someone were to ask me how I felt about the results, I would say I feel fine,” Rose said Friday. “We do have some pockets that are very impressive. We have some results that are good, some average and some that I consider concerning. The concerning results, as well as the average, are not good enough for Canby, and that’s why we will continue to focus on improvements.

“We have a reputation as a very good school district, but we expect that Canby schools should and can be great,” he continued. The desire to become a great district drives our planning and the work occurring weekly through the collaborative team process, as well as efforts by staff and administrators to significantly increase student achievement at every level.”

This year’s report card includes two important changes to increase accountability of schools and ensure consistency in which schools are being identified as needing improvement: a growth model and a simplified rating scale. 

The new growth model measures student learning over time to demonstrate whether schools are helping students make progress towards meeting state achievement standards, said Oregon Department of Education spokesman Jake Weigler. The new report card uses three overall ratings for schools: Outstanding, Satisfactory and Needs Improvement.

Each fall, Oregon releases three major reports on public schools: the Oregon school report cards; student achievement on state tests in reading, writing, mathematics, and science; and the federal Adequate Yearly Progress report required under No Child Left Behind. Of the three reports, the school report cards offer the most complete look at how schools are performing because they include a more thorough review of school quality, Weigler said.

 Included in Oregon’s school report cards is information on student test performance, school improvement, attendance, dropout rates, class size, SAT scores, expulsions due to weapons and teacher education and experience. 
 

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