As Illinois student performance standards get tougher each year, more schools are falling short of the mark, according to statewide report cards released this week.
While most western suburb schools’ overall tests scores were well above the state requirements, the results show that in many cases low-income students and students with disabilities are below the standard.
The annual report cards track performance for the federal No Child Left Behind Act. This year’s reports for the roughly 4,000 schools and 869 districts in Illinois were posted online at iirc.niu.edu Oct. 30.
Out of DuPage County’s 231 elementary, middle and high schools, 55 did not make the grade this year, up from 36 last year.
While many of the substandard schools performed well overall — in almost half, the entire student body performed better than the state average — the schools often fell short because of low grades among certain demographics. In 35 of the schools, for example, students with disabilities did not meet the standard in math or reading.
The report cards are based on the results of two statewide tests, one taken from third to eighth grade and the other given during junior year of high school.
Each school’s report card shows how the entire student body did on the tests, and it breaks down the scores into smaller student demographics. These subgroups — based on race, socioeconomic status or other factors — are measured if a school has 45 or more students in the group.
For a school to achieve “adequate yearly progress,” a certain percent of the entire student body and each subgroup has to pass the bar in both math and reading. In 2009, the minimum is 70 percent.
Schools that continually fall short in the same subject face repercussions that become more rigorous as time goes on.
According to state law, after the first two years of not meeting adequate progress, a school is in “academic early watch status” and has to take steps to improve its scores. After the third year, the district steps in and helps create a “corrective action plan,” which could include lengthening the school day or year and bringing in an outside adviser.
If after four years the school still has not made adequate progress, the district has to draft a more intensive restructuring plan for the school, and that plan is put into place after five years of not making progress.
The state gives school districts several options for the fifth-year restructuring plan, such as reopening as a public charter school, replacing much of the teaching staff or overhauling the curriculum. School districts tend to go with that last option, said Melina Wright, the No Child Left Behind liaison for the Illinois State Board of Education.
Seven years after the No Child Left Behind Act was enacted, some schools still are not making progress even after the fifth-year restructuring. And the law does not require additional steps.
“The law is silent,” Wright said. “For whatever reason the law does not address what happens beyond the restructuring phase.”
All schools, even those that passed this year, are trying to get their scores up. In future years, making the grade will become tougher.
Next year, 77.5 percent of students have to pass, and the goal is to have 100 percent of Illinois public school students passing by 2014.
Rising No Child Left Behind standards caught up with Elmhurst Community Unit School District 205, which failed to make AYP despite more than 88 percent of students meeting or exceeding standards on all state tests.
According to the district’s report cards, several subgroups at three schools failed to make AYP. Hispanic and economically disadvantaged students at Conrad Fischer Elementary School did not meet AYP, while students with disabilities didn’t make AYP in reading and math at Churchville Middle School.
York High School’s economically disadvantaged and students with disabilities did not make AYP for reading and math — the second straight year York failed to make AYP.
Superintendent Lynn Krizic said the district expected some subgroups would not meet AYP this year.
“We’re not surprised Churchville and Fischer did not make AYP, it was getting close to that point, and it was possible that they would not make AYP for this upcoming year,” she said. “But we’re certainly concerned, we don’t have all of our students performing at the same level as other students.”
School officials said the district is currently employing reading intervention programs and support classes for students with disabilities to help boost test scores for students. However, Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction Karen Sullivan said No Child Left Behind standards might be rising too fast for many districts to keep up.
“We anticipate more and more schools in very high performing districts of not making AYP because of rising standards,” she said. “(For example) it’s a pretty big challenge to get 100 percent of students who are not proficient in English to take a state test in English.”
