Attleboro MCAS—Elementary

So last night (a week ago now) the Superintendent presented to the School Committee on Attleboro’s 2012 MCAS results.  Overall the presentation was fair, highlighting much of the positives and at least mentioning, albeit very generally, some of the negatives and again, very generally, how these will be dealt with.

So I figure now that that presentation has been given it’s time to really take a hard look at the MCAS data, not at just the district level, but at each individual school, in comparison to the other schools, the trending and how much a school and/or grade went up or down, as well as the various sub-groups that are tracked.

Now knowing that I have a tendency to allow my articles to go slightly longer than, maybe, at times, they should, I may or may not end up splitting this into two different (or more) articles…

So for now let’s start with looking at Attleboro’s five elementary schools…

As most of you know the MCAS test is taken starting in 3rd grade, so for the elementary schools we have only 3rd and 4th grade results.  And since the Science/Technology test doesn’t start until 5th grade we only have to look at English Language Arts (ELA) and Math.

So here are the results from the past seven years tracking the trending of how these schools (as an aggregate – meaning average of 3rd and 4th grades) did in both ELA (scores in red font are drops from the previous year):

I think much can be learned from this data, especially when you understand the timeline of when administrators came and went.  For example, I know Hill-Roberts very well since I was the PTO President there for 5 years.  I started as the PTO President back in 2006 when Matt Joseph started as Principal.  I know that he worked for a couple of years shifting teachers, especially those in 3rd and 4th grade, hiring new teachers, working with the PTO to bring in technology that was integrated into the classroom learning and more.  So his first two years (2007 & 2008) the scores dropped, but then (it appears) that his reforms took hold and the school’s scores jumped through the roof.  They went from having the worst ELA score in 2008 to the highest in 2009.  Now a one year gain is a good thing and all, but if it can’t be sustained then it loses its value.  But then looking at 2010 his school’s ELA score jumped 5.8% to be the only school in the 90’s, EVER!  Unfortunately this is when he left our district and an interim Principal, who didn’t have the same experience or knowledge in technology was assigned.  That same year the ELA score dropped a couple of points, which again, there will often be one year bumps and jumps.  The problem is that now this year the ELA score dropped 4.8%.  Same with Hymen Fine where they started in the low 80’s, worked their way up to the high 80’s and are now on their way down.

Now on the positive side of things, look at Willet!  Under the administration of Mrs. Zinni this school has gone from one in the low 80’s to hit 90 this year.  In addition, their drop from 2010 to last year was much less than the other schools, which I think says a lot.

Now let’s move on to Math:

Sure seems like a lot of focus was put on math over this timeframe, especially since only two schools went down between 2006 and 2010 (and in both cases the losses were readily made up the following year). 

Again, Hill-Roberts under Mr. Joseph went from a percentage in the mid-70’s to over 90% in 2010, again the only elementary school to ever hit the 90’s.  But now that he has left, the school is trending the wrong way, having dropped over 5% in those two years.  More concerning is Hymen Fine, which went from 74.3% in 2006 to 85% last year, which is when we lost Mrs. White.  On a side note, does anyone know where Mrs. White left for?  Well, the answer is the same district that Mr. Joseph left for.  And knowing the inside information that I know I can say that if Matt had not left our district Cathy probably wouldn’t have either!

One point that was made by the Superintendent during her presentation was that ‘Teachers and administrators will be working to determine why some third graders did poorly in math and how delivery of educational programs to special needs pupils can be improved’.  So let’s take a look at that…

Here are the elementary schools results broken down by grade, so we can try to determine where the issue is.  Maybe, as was explained to the Committee, its one grade, across the district, that is having the issues and which affected the scores…

So first is the ELA scores and I was able to break each school by their grade and show the previous year’s score for reference.  Looking at the data there seems to be some trends that are concerning.  Hill-Roberts' 3rd grade dropped almost 7% in one year, and 7% is a lot, especially when you compare that loss to the other schools - two of which went up and the other two dropped, though these only dropped 2.5% (Hyman Fine) and 0.6% (Thacher).  And in 4th grade the trend continues with Hill-Roberts dropping 3%, while three of the other schools went up and Studley only dropped slightly more than 1%.

Looking for positives out of this I can’t help but see Studley’s 8.1% gain for 3rd grade, but that positive is tempered by the fact that in 2011 Studley was by far the lowest performing school at 77.9%, which was 7% less than the next school and a crazy 16% less than the top performing school.  So when you are starting so low it’s much easier to make up ground.  Continuing to look for positives I see that Willet showed marked improvement in both grades, as compared to last year.  Again great job to Mrs. Zinni and her staff!  Seems like she knows her school and staff so well that that is paying off for the kids!

Now here’s the math data, which again is the area that the Superintendent explained was a concern in regard to the 3rd grade:

Well, I guess I have to share that concern seeing as how every school’s 3rd grade math score dropped. At the same time Willet only dropped 1.2%, which as compared to the other schools says a lot.  With Hill-Roberts’s and Thacher’s dropping 6.9% each, and Hyman-Fine dropping a crazy 13.8%, this is where the questions should be aimed.  What’s the difference between Willet’s 3rd grade math as compared to Hill-Roberts and Thacher, as compared to Hyman Fine?  And knowing the make-up of the schools in regard to the sub-groups that are tracked these results are even more questionable.  One interesting point is how the two schools that dropped the least for 3rd grade were the only two schools that dropped for 4th grade.

And if you think about how the 3rd grade from 2011 is the 4th grade from 2012, then that means that the same students from Studley went from 87.1% (in 2011) to 79.4% (in 2012), an almost 8% drop (yes, different tests with one year separation, but still, same students).

Now during the School Committee meeting Superintendent Durkin said ‘many school districts across the state have noted blips in their third-grade test results this year’ and that ‘she suspects the change may have something to do with the state’s shift to common core curriculum and reformatting of the test, itself’.  But if this was the case then why would the difference between how one school has dropped be so significantly different than how the other schools, within our own district, dropped?  Yes, maybe some of the drop could be attributed to these ‘curriculum and test changes’, but wouldn’t you see these across the board for all schools and all grades?  Again maybe some of this is due to this but that 13.5% reduction in Hyman Fine concerns me and can not be attributed to a curriculum and test change!

But being that this “noted blips” statement was made about other district’s 3rd grade math scores, let’s take a closer look at that…

There are a group of school districts that the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education considers “comparisons” to Attleboro.  Personally I have always had an issue with this list since I would never consider most of these comparables.  But, beyond looking at the actually scores as a comparison I think we could look at these to see if we can see if these “blips” for 3rd grade math are there.  Here’s the data:

One thing that stuck out is how with every one of these districts, with the exception of Attleboro and one other, some of the school’s 3rd grade math score increased while others went down.  I believe this is interesting as it doesn’t seem to support a consistent negative “blip” as was suggested.  But even looking at the averages you can see that most districts had somewhere between a positive 2.4 to a negative 2.9 change.  But let’s take this one step further and look at some of our neighboring district schools…

So to be fair it does appear that there may be a little bit of a negative “blip” due to the change in curriculum and/or test, or possibly this year’s 3rd grade math test just being slightly more difficult than last year.  But all of this data shows that the negative “blip” is really only a small contributor, possibly around -3% or -4% max.  But now looking back at Attleboro’s 3rd grade math test scores there’s a lot of concerns.  Three of our five schools had a higher decrease than what these other districts are seeing and again, one of our schools (Hyman Fine) saw a huge decrease, more so than any other local 3rd grade.  I guess what I’m trying to say is that I would like to see around 90% of Attleboro’s 3rd graders proficient or better in Math, based on these and prior scores, but that was only achieved by one school (Willet).  The fact that two schools (Hill-Roberts and Thacher) dropped almost 7% is a concern, and the fact that Hyman Fine dropped the 13.8% is a major concern that needs to be investigated, explained and a plan developed and put in place to deal with this.

So this is starting to get long, so I think I’ll limit this article to just the Elementary level.  But before summarizing the pros and cons we should take a quick look at the sub-groups…

SUB-GROUPS

The sub-groups that are tracked by the state are English Language Learners (ELL) – meaning English is not their first language, low income, special needs, the various racial sub-groups and a new one this year called “at risk”.  Anyway, I think everyone can agree that there are many reasons why these sub-groups are tracked and that the data can be very useful to see where our district is succeeding and where we are failing the kids and thus a change would be warranted.  Here are Attleboro’s elementary aggregate sub-group results broken down by school:

One point that I should note is that a sub-group is only tracked if there is a certain amount of students within that group.  For example, you’ll see that Willet does not have scores for their Limited English Proficient students, and this would be the reason why.

Let’s look at each sub-group that is tracked…

The Special Education student’s scores are very mixed from school to school.  Once again Willet is a stand out with the highest scores (over 80% in ELA and almost 78% in Math) as compared to Studley at 58.6% in both ELA and Math and Hyman Fine at 59.8% in ELA and 56.1% proficient or higher in Math.  Now I think we all know that the quantity of students with these needs could affect these school’s test scores, and knowing the schools as I do I understand that two of the schools have larger programs (meaning more students in this sub-group) than others.  But that raises my concern for the 2 out of 3 schools that have a smaller quantity of students with these needs.  But maybe I’m jumping the gun here since I’m only looking at this year’s scores.  Maybe these are huge improvements to last year and I’m being overly critical.  Let’s take a look at last year’s scores to see…

Well now I’m even more concerned. 

In ELA Willet, again (anyone seeing a trend), had a huge gain of 13.8% to be the highest performing school in this regard, and last year they were second (albeit distantly) as compared to Hill-Roberts.  Thacher also had a big bump, which is great, while Studley saw a slight gain and Hyman Fine pretty much stayed the same.  But Hill-Roberts dropped 17% in one year!  That number is very concerning, especially since the new principal at Hill-Roberts is a special education expert!

In Math all but one school dropped, and guess which school that is…  Willet – again! Two of these four schools dropped double-digits.  And yes, we may have already established that some of this drop may be due to the change in test or due to this year’s test being more difficult, but then why would Mrs. Zinni and her staff be able to go from 69% to 80% while everyone else is dropping 7%, 8%, 11% and 15%?  Something needs to be done in this area right away and what that is needs to be explained to the parents and School Committee so it can be understood and tracked.  In my opinion, we need a goal for this school year that addresses this issue!

Next is Low Income students…

This one seems pretty consistent across the district, with some minor stand outs.   Studley is the lowest performing in this regard, in both ELA and Math.  But again, before jumping to conclusions let’s look at a comparison to last year…

So once again Willet is way ahead of the curve and again, sure seems like Mrs. Zinni and her staff over at Willet are doing amazing things.  Not something I would ever want to see messed with…

Ummm…  anyway, Hill-Roberts again is concerning since they were the only school to drop in ELA and dropped the most in Math.  But maybe this just highlights how amazing Matt Joseph was as a leader, not to mention the numerous 3rd and/or 4th grade teachers (the grades that take MCAS) that have left the school or the district!  At this point Hill-Roberts has gone from the best school in almost every way to smack dab in the middle of things.  What a shame!

I think a fair expectation for the low income students is around 80% in ELA and 80% in Math.  This may be stretching, but isn’t that what we should be trying to do.  So what needs to be done in order to achieve this?  Seems like one more perfect goal for this year!

Next is Limited English Proficient or English Language Learners, whatever you want to call it.  One point that should be noted is that this year prior ELL students, meaning they are no longer considered ELL since they now have that ability, are still tracked in this category…

Once again, what is happening to Hill-Roberts?  They dropped from 91.7% in Math to 73.1% in Math in one year?  Again maybe this is somewhat due to the amazing gains that the school saw when Matt Joseph was the principal or maybe this is the norm, and I think it’s great that Studley and Thacher are positively trending in ELA for this sub-group, but again we need something to change in this area and again I would say another annual goal is warranted…

SUMMARY

So one thing that I think really stands out in all of this is how certain elementary schools are in a negative spiral.  And when you compare these results to the tenure of the administrator, there seems to be a correlation.  For example, when Matt Joseph was at Hill-Roberts it seemed to take a couple of years for his (and his staff’s) initiatives to pay dividends, but once they did the results were amazing.  And now that he has left it’s almost like starting over.  Same over at Hyman Fine where gains were seen under the leadership of Cathy White and now those gains, and more, have been lost.  And that leads to the fair question of whether Cathy would have left Attleboro if Matt had not left first, or if Matt would have left if something was different…

On the opposite side of the coin you have Willet where Mrs. Zinni and her staff, over a couple of years, now have that school’s performance as the best in the district (and in some cases by a lot).  So would you keep her at the school where she is succeeding or move her to another school and start the process over for two schools?  Well, personally I would have kept her right where she was, but that is not the decision that was made, which is such a shame.  The data shows exactly what I always believed, that consistency in the school’s principals leads to greater achievement, and this continues to be an area where Attleboro has issues.  Wouldn’t it have made more sense to keep Mrs. Zinni right where she was, promote Mrs. Campbell to the position of Principal at the school she was at, and relocate the one principal, who is a special needs expert, to the school that has the special needs programs?

Sorry, went off on a tangent there…  Anyway…

So, here are the cons:

- Hill Roberts has dropped in ELA (aggregate) almost 5% this year.
- Hill Roberts has dropped in Math (aggregate) almost 3% this year.
- Hyman Fine has dropped in Math (aggregate) 6.4% this year.
- Studley has dropped in Math (aggregate) 3.7% this year
- Studley has only 58.6% of special needs students proficient or better in both ELA and Math.
- Hyman Fine has only 59.8% of special needs students proficient or better in ELA, and only 56.1% in Math.
- For the special needs, English language learners and low income sub-groups, all schools have dropped in Math, except Willet.
- Studley’s overall performance compared to other schools in the same grade span in Massachusetts is at 50%.
- Hyman Fine’s overall performance compared to other schools in the same grade span in Massachusetts is at 62%.
- Willet’s overall performance compared to other schools in the same grade span in Massachusetts is at 65% (but they seem to be heading in the right direction).
- Hyman Fine’s 3rd grade dropped 13.8% in Math this year.

Here are the pros:

- Studley, Thacher and Willet all increased about 3% in ELA this year.
- Willet’s ELA (aggregate) is 90%.
- Hill-Roberts’ overall performance compared to other schools in the same grade span in Massachusetts is at 72%.
- Thacher’s overall performance compared to other schools in the same grade span in Massachusetts is at 77%.
- Thacher’s 4th grade ELA increased 6.6% this year.
- Willet’s 4th grade ELA increased 4.1% this year.

So overall I see a couple of good things, especially Willet’s results this year.  But at the same time there are many concerns.  Generally Attleboro’s elementary schools lost ground and these need to be honestly discussed, researched, explained and goals need to be set for this year that explain what will be done and how it will help these areas of concern.

Next time I’ll be writing about the Middle School results.