Follow-up finds more schools meet criteria.

Byline: The Register-Guard

More Oregon schools met the expectations of the federal No Child Left Behind Act than it initially appeared last August, according to follow-up data made public today by the state Department of Education.

Under federal guidelines that calculate school performance differently than the state's own report card, 344 of the state's 1,191 schools failed to meet targets in one or more of an array of categories, including test scores in reading and math and test participation among students from each major racial and ethnic group, economically disadvantaged students, students with disabilities and "limited English proficient" students.

The net total is down by 27 from a previous report, although 66 schools in all - including Eugene's Spencer Butte Middle School and nearly all of the schools in the Creswell, Siuslaw and McKenzie districts - corrected data or successfully challenged designations that at first indicated they had not made "adequate yearly progress," or AYP.

On the flip side, 21 schools that initially appeared to pass muster actually missed targets and fell into the "not met" category under No Child Left Behind. Another 56 schools' ratings were pending in the initial report; of those, about 70 percent met targets.

School districts have been frustrated by inaccuracies in the preliminary report, whose release is usually played more prominently in the media than the final report. But officials with the Department of Education say the law requires public release of the ratings a month before school starts, giving vacationing district officials little time to verify the complex and copious data they must submit to the state.

"I think we're getting better, but the amount of data and reports that we have to give the state, it's a lot of data points and there are a lot of places where there can be errors," Siuslaw Superintendent Gerald Hamilton said. "That's the real unfortunate thing with this AYP is they put it out - the preliminary - and then they ask you to go back and clean it up."

Hamilton said he did his best to explain the ratings to district staff, parents and the local media, and that he heard few if any concerns about why three of four schools supposedly fell short of federal standards.

Last year, the first year in which the new standards were applied nationwide, 329 of Oregon's 1,216 schools missed the mark. (The number of schools in Oregon dwindled by 25 this year, mainly because of budget-driven consolidations and closures.) In terms of the percentage of schools meeting the federal standard, Oregon fared slightly worse, with 71 percent making AYP compared to 73 percent last year.

While educators voice wholehearted support for the No Child Left Behind goals of closing achievement gaps that separate groups of students, many have been critical of the law's all-or-nothing approach to rating schools and what they see as a lack of sufficient funding to make it work. Many also dislike the escalating consequences imposed on schools that repeatedly miss the mark. Only schools receiving Title I money, earmarked for disadvantaged students, face those consequences.

- Anne Williams

AYP CHANGES

These schools either had not been rated or had been rated wrong on the preliminary list of which schools made "adequate yearly progress," or AYP, under the federal No Child Left Behind Act:

Yujin Gakuen Elementary School: Met

Kennedy Middle School: Met

Spencer Butte Middle School: Met

Churchill Alternative School: Not met

North Eugene Alternative High School: Not met

Opportunity Center: Not met

Creslane Elementary School: Met

Creswell Middle School: Met

Creswell High: Met

Rhododendron Elementary School: Met

Rhododendron Primary School: Met

Siuslaw High School: Met

McKenzie Elementary School: Met

McKenzie High: Met

Mohawk Junior/Senior High School: Met

Triangle Lake School: Met

Elkton Elementary: Met

North Douglas High: Met