Elementary School Planned Improvement

We are very pleased with the math and reading scores on the School Report Card.  While we are pleased, we want to continue to implement those strategies that have been so successful in raising the scores to their present level.  The reading scores at third grade indicate that 30 percent (12 students) of last years students did not meet or exceed the state standards in reading.  However, 69 percent (27 students) did meet or exceed the state expectations on the Illinois Standards Achievement Test.    At the Fifth grade level, the results were not quite as positive as only 56 percent of the students met or exceeded the state expectations. We are going to evaluate the strategies, and their implementation, that have been used at that grade level.  We intend to continue collaboration between special and regular education at all grades to be able to meet the needs of all students.  A significant portion of our building is “inclusion” and the staff has become a team that is meeting student needs.  We have had good success in identifying at risk students with the use of the ISEL and S.T.A.R reading assessments and we are going to continue with the use of them as we implement the use of D.I.B.E.L.S. (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) to complete our assessment tools.  We will continue with the Saxon Math program that has enjoyed success here and at other schools around the country.  Our writing program will have to be reevaluated after this years scores.  We only have 44.7 percent that met the state expectations in writing and none that exceeded the state expectations on the state achievement test at the third grade.  Under the No Child Left Behind Act a school must have at least 40 percent meet or exceed state expectations.  This puts us very near failing to meet the standard in writing at the third grade level. 

We will have training and activities from the Mid-Illini Educational Cooperative that will directly address the writing program.  The training provided by Mid-Illini has proved successful with other school systems that needed to address their programs. 

Mathematics and Writing scores at the Fifth grade level were acceptable as solid numbers of the students taking the test scored in the “Meets” category.  On the math portion of the test 63 percent of the students were in the “Meets” category, but none were in the “Exceeds” category.   On the writing portion of the test 67 percent of the students were in the “Meets” category but none scored in the “Exceeds” category.  We are hopeful that the continued use of the strategies in place will continue to move students up the scale on the test-moving students from the “Does not meet” category to the “Meets” category, from the “Meets” category to the “Exceeds” category. 

Our Fourth grade scores in the categories of Science and Social Science were both very acceptable and we are currently studying additional strategies in anticipation of the expanded Illinois Standards Achievement Test that will be implemented in two years.