The Arlington school system showed improvement last year on the Standards of
Learning tests and exceeded its goal under the federal No Child Left Behind law,
but a third of the county’s schools still failed to meet all their targets.
Ten of Arlington’s 30 schools did not make "Adequate Yearly Progress" in either
math or reading in at least one category. All four of the elementary schools
that failed to achieve AYP missed their targets in only one or two demographic
groups.
"The results show we are making progress in pass rates for Standards of Learning
tests," said School Board member Ed Fendley. "But it also shows we have some
work to do."
School Board member Dave Foster said he was pleased by the modest gains shown
this year, cautioned that the school system still has far to go before it meets
parents’ expectations.
"We’re moving in the right direction, but not as quickly as we’d like or
uniformly," Foster said.
Elementary schools made the greatest strides, with four schools — Abingdon,
Barcroft, Claremont and Hoffman-Boston — not meeting all of their goals, down
from seven the previous year. Only two schools did not pass every reading
category, compared to seven in the 2004-2005 year.
After Arlington students experienced greater difficulty with the reading exams
last year, school officials asked teachers to spend more time in the classroom
developing reading skills.
"People were paying attention to the results last year," Superintendent Robert
Smith said. "Schools made adjustments, and I think it made an impact."
The standards for achieving AYP last year were more stringent than in the past:
69 percent of students from each demographic group had to pass the reading exam,
up from 65 percent last year, and 67 percent of students in each group had to
pass the mathematics exam, up from 63 percent in 2004-2005. Students in grades
four, six and seven were tested for the first time, joining their counterparts
in grades three, five and eight.
SCHOOL OFFICIALS cautioned that the results were preliminary and could change as
final numbers come in later this fall.
All five Arlington middle schools failed to meet their objectives under the No
Child Left Behind law, with one school missing in eight different categories.
The main reason for the "disappointing" results, Smith said, was the performance
of sixth- and seventh-graders, classes that had never been tested before. Since
it was a new test, Smith believes the passing level for the two grades may have
been set too high.
Scores for subgroups are only counted if more than 50 students in the category
take the test. As a result of the influx of new test takers, Arlington middle
schools failed for the first time in a variety of subgroups including students
with disabilities and those with limited English proficiency.
The most important factor in helping more Arlington schools make AYP this school
year is identifying the areas where individual students require the greatest
amount of support and tailoring the curriculum to meet those needs, school
officials said.
The school system runs data analysis of every student’s test scores and provides
that information to teachers. It is imperative that teachers then implement that
knowledge in the classroom by paying extra attention to students who struggle,
school officials said.
"We are going to work with kids who are experiencing difficulty, and try to make
sure he or she does better," Smith said.
School officials also cautioned parents not to read too much into a single test.
Administrators have expressed frustration at the federal requirement’s sliding
targets, because they can often obscure the school system’s progress.
If a school improves by 8 percent in a category but still misses its target
under AYP, it is branded a failure when in fact it is a success story, school
officials said.
"You can’t look at these results in isolation," Fendley said. "They are
important indicators, but only one measure of how are kids and schools are
doing."