Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2006 > August > 01
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
Shocking news: Dayton out of “academic emergency”
By Scott Elliott
Dayton Daily News
Dayton Public Schools Superintendent Percy Mack has some stunning news for 2,500 district staff when he delivers his convocation speech this morning:
The district is no longer in “academic emergency”
And the good news may not stop there.
It appears from numbers Mack (pictured above) reported Tuesday night that Dayton Public Schools will jump two rungs on Ohio’s rating system and settle in “continuous improvement,” the middle of five rating categories.
That would be an enormous change of fortunes for Dayton, which for the past three years has been last or tied for last among all 611 Ohio school districts for report card results.
Friday was the last day to submit data and corrections to the Ohio Department of Education, which will issue its ranking of districts Aug. 15.
At Tuesday’s board meeting, Mack said Dayton reported a performance index score of 73.2. That score — a measure of district performance across all tests taken — is up from 66.4 last year and 61.3 the prior year.
According to the state’s rules, any district with a performance index score of at least 70 can be rated no lower than “academic watch.” And those that grow the score by 10 points in two years, including growth of 3 points in the most recent year, move up one more rung to “continuous improvement.”
Dayton can thank the state’s new system, which rewards test score growth, for its escape from academic emergency.
But not only was its growth enough to reach “continuous improvement,” Mack said, the district fell just short of making “adequate yearly progress.”
That standard, measured by the federal No Child Left Behind law, requires districts to meet pre-set test scores and attendance at several grades, and ensure all minority groups make gains.
Mack said Dayton met all the requirements for adequate yearly progress except one. Poor students classified as “economically disadvantaged” attended school 92.9 percent of the time last year. The federal standard requires 93 percent attendance.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Omega’s principal problems
Not even two weeks ago, I met with the new leadership of the Omega School of Excellence, including the upbeat new principal, Tracy Ross. Two days after my story about the school appeared with a large photo of Ross, she was fired.
The management company leading the school, called KIDS (Keys to Improving Dayton Schools, Inc.), won’t explain why it let Ross go less than a month after she was hired and just a few weeks before school starts.
In an unfortunate coincidence for the school, three days after Ross was fired, the woman she replaced sued the school over her termination in March. Although KIDS says it didn’t make the call to fire Michelle Frazier Trotman, the group was hired prior to Trotman’s dismissal and took over running the school when she left.
The school’s founder, the Rev. Vanessa Oliver Ward, indicated she thought Omega did right by Trotman when it paid her salary three months after she was let go until her contract ended. But Trotman’s contract states she must have 180 days notice to be fired and she was given just 108 days notice.
KIDS, a new group that hopes to make a business out of “reconstituting” low scoring schools with new, effective academic staffs, appears to be off to a bit of a bumpy start.
Permalink | Comments (7) | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice
