Saline Schools Make The Grade But Some Must Address Achievement Gap

Saline’s public schools continue to make the grade.

Each of the district’s conventional schools made “Adequate Yearly Progress,” which measures student achievement on statewide assessments as required by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

Saline’s schools also performed well on the Education Yes! Grades, even as grades fell across the state because they are based on scores of standardized tests that are graded more rigorously.

Harvest, Heritage, Woodland Meadows and Saline High School received “A” grades. Saline Middle School and Pleasant Ridge received “B” grades.

Saline Alternative High School, which did not make AYP overall and in math, did not receive a grade.

Despite some of the best results in the state, Saline Area Schools will have work to do. The state has three new “accountability designations” for schools — Reward Schools, Focus Schools and Priority Schools.

Saline High School and Harvest Elementary both achieved “Reward School” status, which goes to the top five percent of all Michigan schools in the annual top-to-bottom ranking and the top five percent making the greatest academic progress over the past four years.

Pleasant Ridge, Woodland Meadows and Heritage elementary schools were deemed “Focus Schools,” which are the top 10 percent of schools in the state in terms of widest achievement gaps — the disparity between the top 30 and bottom 30 percent of students. The schools are now charged with bridging the gap.

According to a press release from the Michigan Department of Education, the MDE will develop and provide a “District Toolkit” for districts that have Focus Schools. MDE will provide technical assistance to these districts on the use of the toolkits in the form of MDE-trained and paid-for District Improvement Facilitators.

With the assistance of these facilitators, districts will have one year to self-diagnose and self-prescribe customized changes in their supports to the Focus Schools and their students.

Districts that continue to have schools identified as “Focus Schools” in 2013-14 will have to purchase the services of a facilitator who will study the data and recommend a plan.