Daily Review, The & Sunday Review (Towanda, PA)
April 9, 2011
HEADLINE: Schools in NH short of standards - Nashua has 16 tabbed as needing improvement

By Michael Brindley

The number of New Hampshire schools labeled "in need of improvement" has risen sharply since 2008, as No Child Left Behind's benchmarks continue to ratchet up toward the law's ultimate mandate of universal proficiency in math and reading.

Out of the state's 469 public schools, 307, or 65 percent, have been given the "improvement" tag, based on "Adequate Yearly Progress" designations released by the state Department of Education on Friday.

That's up from 183 schools during the 2007-08 school year.

Schools are labeled as needing improvement after not making AYP for two consecutive years. That's based on the results of the New England Common Assessment Program, an annual assessment of math and reading for students in grades 3-8, as well as high school juniors.

There was some good news locally. Captain Samuel Douglass Academy in Brookline was one of 11 schools in the state to remove itself from the "improvement" list.

The school made AYP in math for two consecutive years, shedding the title. This year, 81 percent of the school's students scored proficient or better in math. That's up from 75 percent during the 2007-08 school year.

Hollis/Brookline Associate Superintendent Betsey Cox-Buteau said the turnaround is a result of school staff addressing math through targeted intervention for struggling students, tightening the curriculum and common assessments so teachers could see the progress students were making during the year.

Cox-Buteau said the "in need of improvement" designation can have some benefits.

"It causes a school to do some self reflection and determine what needs to be done to improve student achievement," she said.

To make adequate progress, students must meet performance targets set by the state as a school and in specific subgroups of students, such as low income, special education and minorities.

As part of the state's compliance with No Child Left Behind, those targets are increased every other year, to the point where all students must be proficient in math and reading by the 2013-14 school year. Schools must also meet participation, attendance and graduation benchmarks to make AYP. Fourteen high schools missed the graduation rate benchmark of 80 percent.

Critics of the law have argued that's an unreasonable mandate for public schools, many of which have had to face sanctions such as offering school choice and replacing principals or other staff for failing to meet the increasingly high benchmarks.

Sixteen of Nashua's 17 schools are now "in need of improvement," with Amherst Street, Birch Hill and Main Dunstable elementary schools new to the list this year. Bicentennial Elementary School is the only Nashua school not on the list. It's also the school with the fewest low-income students in the city.

Amherst Street was able to get off the list three years ago, but is now back on.

Brian Cochrane, the district's director of accountability and assessment, said the needing improvement designation loses meaning when virtually all of the city's schools receive it. The district has been focusing less on the labels and more on making sure students are making progress and growing, he said.

"Realistically, what we've been focusing on for the last couple years is not so much of the backdrop of NCLB, but the spirit of NCLB," Cochrane said.

Roughly a quarter of the state's schools made AYP this year in both reading and math; 197 made AYP in reading and 166 made AYP in math. The designations are preliminary. Schools have 30 days to appeal to the state Department of Education.

With No Child Left Behind overdue for reauthorization and the state's involvement with the Common Core Standards up in the air, how the state will measure progress among schools in the future is uncertain.