FEW SCHOOLS MEET STANDARD GAINS ARE NOT ENOUGH TO MEET STIFFER FEDERAL GOALS.

Byline: Karen Maeshiro Staff Writer

LANCASTER - Fewer than a third of Antelope Valley's 113 public schools met federal academic requirements this year, according to results released Wednesday.

Students at 72 campuses improved Academic Performance Index scores, but for 34 schools, the gains were not enough to meet newly stiffened Adequate Yearly Progress goals, or the gains didn't include all subgroups of students, such as ethnic minorities, low-income and disabled students.

``I personally question the fact that you have a number of schools in a large district, they meet every single criteria but because of one specific subgroup or content area, everything else is disallowed. That's a tough one,'' Antelope Valley Union High School District Superintendent David Vierra said. ``Teachers and staff are busting their tails day in and day out, and to be told they are failing is not accurate at all.''

Quartz Hill High was the only one of the high school district's seven traditional campuses to meet all of its Adequate Yearly Progress components, although six of them improved their Academic Performance Index scores.

State education officials released the 2005 Accountability Progress Report on Wednesday for every California public school and district to show how well they are meeting state and federal accountability requirements.

The report contained state Academic Performance Index scores for each school and showed which schools reached their federal AYP goals. The goals include meeting minimum proficiency, test participation and graduation rates and a certain API level as required under the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act.

Statewide, 83 percent of California's public schools posted increases in their API scores this year, compared to 64 percent in 2004.

Fixty-six percent of California schools successfully met their AYP targets, down from 65 percent the previous year, records show. The federal goal is to have 100 percent of children proficient in math and English by the year 2014, which state education officials complain will be very difficult to do.

To meet AYP targets this year, 24.4 percent of elementary and middle school students had to be proficient in English and 26.5 percent in math, compared to 13.6 percent and 16 percent, respectively, last year.

At high schools, the proficiency rates were raised from 11.2 percent in English and 9.6 in math to 22.3 percent and 20.9, respectively.

The API minimum scores that had to be reached went from 560 to 590 under federal guidelines.

``It is important to remember the dramatic escalation in the AYP targets when viewing this year's results,'' state schools Superintendent Jack O'Connell said in a written statement. ``The dichotomy in the progress reports released today underscores why we support our state API growth model as a more accurate reflection of trends in our schools.''

The Antelope Valley school with the highest API gain was the Henry Hearns Charter School of Academic Excellence, which ironically was shut down by the high school district over low attendance and financial problems. Hearns' score increased 132 points from 672 to 804.

Among regular schools, Tierra Bonita South Elementary School in the Eastside Union School District had the highest API point gain of 91.

``We are very happy with the test scores, and they confirm my belief that at this school we have wonderful, competent, and dedicated teachers,'' Principal Sally Szwenick said.

Tierra Bonita South also made all its Adequate Yearly Progress goals.

Szwenick gave credit to an education consulting firm, DataWorks, hired with money from a school improvement grant.

``They came into our school in February 2004 and held four parent meetings in English and Spanish to elicit help from the home. They would come in and observe people teaching and suggest strategies,'' Szwenick said.

But she also noted that pupils took the standardized tests in May, three months after the firm started its work.

``The beauty of this school's high performance is that it couldn't have been all DataWorks,'' Szwenick said.

Antelope Valley Union High School District officials said their high schools mainly failed to meet AYP goals because special-education students did not meet the targets.

As an example of the peculiarities of the comparing the state and federal accountability systems, Quartz High High School's API dropped by five points but yet still met its AYP target, district officials pointed out.

In the two biggest elementary school districts, only a handful of schools met their AYP goals. In the Palmdale School District, three of 27 schools met their AYP targets; in the Lancaster School District, three of 19 did.

``Our end goal is to have all of our schools at or above the federal government requirement. We not only made growth overall, but in each subarea that the state and federal governments look at,'' said Phil Rosell, Lancaster School District's director of curriculum, instruction and assessment.

``We also made growth for the last three years in each subgroup. Although the growth was not enough for the federal requirements, we have made growth in each one of those groups,'' Rosell said.

Karen Maeshiro, [phone]

karen.maeshiro(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

2 boxes

Box:

(1) MAKING THE GRADE

(2) API RESULTS

Source: California Department of Education