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The good news keeps coming in for the Attleboro school system. Less than two weeks after congratulatory remarks appeared in this space for Attleboro High School gaining full accreditation and removal of a warning, three elementary schools in the city were taken off the non-compliance list for MCAS testing.
"Our gains this year were large," said Superintendent Pia Durkin, referring to the recently released State Annual Yearly Progress report, based on last spring's MCAS tests.
The Hill-Roberts, Thacher and Willett elementary schools were commended by the state for dramatic improvement and removed from a list of non-compliant schools. Major gains were posted by sixth graders in English and third graders in math and both of these test groups topped the state average.
But there were losses, though Durkin categorized them as small and in some cases as "heartbreakers," where target scores were missed by less than a point.
That eighth graders English and seventh graders math scores actually fell is a matter of concern - highlighted by the heady gains elsewhere - while improvement standards for subgroups, including students of limited English-speaking skills and special education, were missed, as has been a familiar story in area schools.
This attention to subgroups illustrates one value seldom mentioned in the arguments over statewide testing, as frequent as they are. While special education has its advocates in local councils for children and elsewhere, their political clout is far less than that for students in regular programs. Backing for limited-English students is far smaller and, in the current political climate, often provoking of backlash. The state's position that improvement targets simply must be met diminishes the local political sensitivity in allocating resources. Attleboro's shortcomings to the subgroups are small. The scores for limited English-speaking third to fifth graders were off by less than a point, for instance, and the same went for seventh grade math scores.
We look forward to these hurdles being overcome and believe that partners in the community would be willing to help in the effort, as they did through Campaign Read when reading scores were falling short and continue to do today through Activate Attleboro, mounted in response to the rising obesity rate among
students.
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