Report Cards

The 2015-2016 Ohio School Report Cards, released Sept. 16, has revealed a significant drop in performance for state school districts, as the state has raised its expectations for school test scores. As a result, only two school districts in the state were awarded A grades, while seven received an F.

The report holds the school districts accountable based on six major components: Achievement; Progress; Gap Closing; Graduation Rate; K-3 Literacy; and Prepared for Success.

The “Achievement” component  “represents the number of students who passed the state tests and how well they performed on them.” Under this component, two grades are given: “Indicators Met,” and the “Performance Index” (PI).

The PI calculates student performances on the Ohio Achievement Assessments (OAA) and Ohio Graduation Tests (OGT) that takes test scores from third to eighth grade and tenth grade.

As of now, school districts are looking at the PI as an overall grade for the schools/school districts because the state is not giving an overall grade during test transitions.

In Portage County, the highest PI ranking school district is Aurora City with a B (87.1%). The lowest ranking is Windham Exempted Village School District with a D (64.4%). The Kent City School District was given a C (75.9%) on its PI.

“This year we saw a pretty significance decrease in the performance of students across the state,” Aurora Superintendent Pat Ciccantelli says. “So a lot of folks saw their report card grades go down, which is challenging, but ours were still in the top ten in the state. Ours were still really really good, but we want to make sure everything is as strong as we can be so we take deep dives into that data to see how our students perform.”

She adds, “I think accountability is apart of education, that’s what we have to do; see how our students are doing. You don’t want to give [the report cards]  too much emphasis, it is only one measure. It is a little naïve to ignore those tests, they are very good measures, they’re very rigorous. Some people didn’t do as well, and we didn’t do as well as we’d liked but that just means more work for us to continue to help our students be as successful as they can.”

The Akron Area School Superintendent’s Association, which includes school district members from Portage County, sent out a letter to its community members in which it addresses the state report cards.

The letter calls the report cards “seriously flawed” and “is not reflective of the quality of education being provided” to its students.

The letter also says, “We, as responsible school leaders, welcome accountability and transparency and recognize that Ohio’s accountability system is in transition. However, it is difficult to utilize a report card that is a constantly changing document, made up of flawed components. This report card does not consistently measure how local school districts are actually performing.”

The Superintendent’s Association’s letter assures its community that its districts “work hard each day to provide the best possible educational experience” for its students.

Walter Davis, president of the Superintendent’s Association told Akron’s South Side News Leader, “We welcome accountability and transparency in the education experience our districts provide our students. As such, it’s important for us to provide the facts to our districts’ residents.”

Greg Isler, superintendent for Wyndham Exempted Village, agrees.

“Accountability is good. I think there’s inadequacy in [the reports] but I think we have to have some sort of accountability system. I hope we eventually get it stabilized as to what it is. It can be frustrating because the portrait painted to the communities isn’t always accurate.”