Left behind

By GINA KINSLOW
Glasgow Daily Times

GLASGOW April 17, 2008 03:53 pm

— The Barren County School District will be one of several included in the Kentucky Department of Education’s “Successful School” reviews.
District officials learned of the selection following a scholastic review by KDE.
The district underwent the review because it did not meet “No Child Left Behind” goals in one category — exceptional children in math. Overall, schools in the district met NCLB goals.
“Since under NCLB, a district is treated as one entity, it’s very possible for all schools in the district to meet their goals, but for the district to not meet all of its goals,” said Lisa Gross, a spokesperson for KDE. “Usually that has to do with population.”
In order for a school to be held accountable for the performance of a specific population of students, such as low income, minority or limited English, there must be at least 10 students in that population per grade tested each year and 60 students in the population schoolwide or the population count comprises 15 percent of all students in the grades tested, she said.
“Those requirements hold for districts, too, so schools within the district might not have enough students in a given population, but once the data is aggregated at the district level, there may be enough,” Gross said.
KDE chooses which schools receive “Successful School” reviews. Data collected during the review gives state officials comparison information they can use in charting state data, said Benny Lile, director of instruction.
“The data they gathered here will be used in the Successful School review, because according to CATS (Commonwealth Accountability Testing System) all of our schools are successful,” he said.
This is not the first time Barren County did not meet NCLB goals as a district. Last year it missed meeting the goal in the same category as this year. In 2006 and 2005, it missed meeting NCLB goals as a district in reading and math for exceptional students. In 2004, it missed meeting the math performance goal for exceptional students, and in 2004 it missed meeting the reading and math performance goals for exceptional students.
“Because the district missed goals, it was subject to consequences, and those increased every year,” Gross said.
One of the requirements for failing to meet the same goal two years in a row is a scholastic review. There were 36 districts statewide that failed to meet their goals two years in a row, Gross said.