The numbers crunchers at Arlington schools are predicting that this year's state testing results will earn the district a near doubling of the number of campuses that are rated exemplary and recognized by the state.
The district, along with others in the county, recently received preliminary Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) results. According to Arlington, those preliminary results show the number of exemplary campuses will go from three to five when school accountability rankings are released in August. The number of recognized campuses will go from 15 to 30, they said.
The Texas Education Agency expects to release state-wide preliminary TAKS results early next week, according to a spokeswoman there.
Arlington Superintendent Jerry McCullough credited the preliminary results to the hard work that's been going on at Arlington campuses. He said gains were particularly strong in science.
"That was a weak point for us, but all the schools got in there and did a lot of activities that emphasize science," he said. "We focused on it and we saw results."
McCullough has set a goal of attaining recognized status for the district. That will not happen this year. Officials said the district's science scores were not high enough to be considered for recognized status. Also, for a district to be recognized, no campus can be ranked academically unacceptable and one junior high in the district will miss the mark this year, McCullough said.
"We're going to get there," McCullough said. "Our focus is on instruction and we're going to keep that focus."
Arlington is currently ranked academically acceptable.
Want to see how your school did? Here's the district press release.
Super job Arlington I.S.D. students, teachers, parents, administration and Board. This truly is the best District in the area. You only missed recognized by one and made huge strides this year. You are all winners!!!!
Posted by: Amy | May 28, 2009 at 09:01 PM
J. L. Long Middle School and Woodrow Wilson High School also host the regional socohl for the deaf and also took a ratings hit. However, at the same time Woodrow was named one of the top socohls in the nation by the Washington Post for AP participation. The year prior it was on the Newsweek list and received the ACT College Readiness Award (top 5% of socohls eligible). A recent Dallas Morning News study showed that it was one of only 20 North Texas area socohls that exceeds expectations for college readiness. That data was from 2009 and since then Woodrow has improved the percentage of its seniors going to college to 88% in 2010 and 90% in 2011.In March Woodrow was certified as an International Baccalaureate World School after a three-year process and extensive site visit. It is now in the second year of a four year redesign into four college preparatory academies: Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM); Business, Finance and Entrepreneurship; Performing Arts and IB. J. L. Long was accepted as a candidate socohl for IB MYP and as such can now offer the Middle Years Programme curriculum (they also added Mandarin Chinese). Less than tw0 dozen public socohls in Texas offer IB MYP. Long always places among the top teams in the state in TMSCA UIL science and math competition and once beat St. Mark's in Mathcounts.In the last reporting period, the Dallas Morning News showed a 16% rise in East Dallas home prices..Are you thinking maybe the TAKS rankings are a bit off? What any prospective East Dallas Lakewood homebuyer should understand is that our area is much like a small town in the big city. We have students of all levels and of all backgrounds. An outstanding education is available for all.Woodrow and Long had to campaign for several years to get the deaf education program. It was sought not only because many thought it would be a good idea to keep the friends from Stonewall together through secondary socohls but also because they add so much to our community. If you've ever seen Woodrow's Deaf "Choir" sign to the National Anthem, you know what I mean.
Posted by: Fion | April 24, 2012 at 02:33 PM