Category: District 186

Only 1 in 10 Black ES and MS Students in 186 Showed ELA Proficiency in 2023

…and that’s just the start.

As our local newspapers’ capacity to cover local news has been greatly reduced, I’ve decided to offer some minimal coverage of our local school board. The plan is simply to offer up things that could go unnoticed for folks who don’t tune in to things like local school board meetings. I’ll likely add context and some commentary where I think it might be helpful.

Education news site The74 reported on the Missouri NAACP filing a federal civil rights complaint based on the disparities between Black and white students’ literacy scores across the state.

In my last post, I pointed to District 186’s 23% ELA proficiency rate in 2023. The story out of Missouri got me wondering a couple things: 1) How does 2023’s proficiency rate compare to years’ past? 2) How have the District’s Black students historically compared to their white peers in ELA proficiency?

Getting that data required a little digging on the District’s State Report Card. First, a historical look at District ELA elementary and middle school proficiency as measured by standardized assessments since 2012.

ELA
YEAR% PROFICIENTASSESSMENT
201267ISAT
201348ISAT
201446ISAT
201529PARCC
201629PARCC
201729PARCC
201827PARCC
201926.9IAR
2020N/AN/A
202121IAR
202221IAR
202323IAR
Source: https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/District.aspx?source=profile&Districtid=51084186025

Next up, disaggregation of those data to show proficiency rates for Black and white students on those same assessments.

ELA
YEAR% PROFICIENTASSESSMENT
BW
20125278ISAT
20133061ISAT
20142758ISAT
201513.539.9PARCC
201614.140.2PARCC
201714.640.3PARCC
201813.537.5PARCC
201913.638.3IAR
2020N/AN/AN/A
20217.830.6IAR
20229.133.1IAR
20231035.5IAR
Source: https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/District.aspx?source=profile&Districtid=51084186025

For 2023 Black students represented 44% of the District’s student body while white students made up 36.9%. Those numbers are not tremendously different since 2018 – 40%, 43/6% respectively – the earliest year such data are available on the state report card.

In addition to the obvious racial disparities above, is the fact total proficiency rates were already in decline before the pandemic, which is often blamed for poor student performance.

Still, 9 out of 10 Black elementary and middle school students in the District were unable to show proficiency in reading in 2023, and they were 25.5 percent behind their white peers.

For comparison, the Missouri NAACP complaint was based on 14% of Missouri’s Black third graders showing ELA proficiency compared to 61% of their white peers.

In District 186, 9.5% of Black third graders showed proficiency last year compared to 26.9% of their white peers.

At the Nov. 6, 2023 meeting of the School Board, none of these numbers was discussed and no questions were asked about ELA proficiency. The District’s presentation of the data focused on growth percentiles, and did not give an overview of proficiency data by sub-groups. Board members did not ask for that data.

Nine out of ten…no one asked questions.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=g5Wl-k4sul8%3Fsi%3Dax0D1ArFG_Ef4gud%26start%3D3190

What’s Happening with Superintendent Gill’s Goals?

As out local daily newspaper’s capacity to cover local news has been greatly reduced, I’ve decided to offer some minimal coverage of our local school board. The plan is simply to offer up things that could go unnoticed for folks who don’t tune in to things like local school board meetings. I’ll likely add context and some commentary where I think it might be helpful.

The Gist

  • Eight out of every ten district students test below proficient in reading.
  • Four out of every ten district high school students won’t graduate in four years.
  • The Superintendent made public six goals to improve these conditions and committed to four public progress reports on those goals.
  • Those reports never happened.
  • School Board members either forgot about the progress reports or ignored the fact they didn’t happen.

The Whole Story

This might seem like reaching into the wayback machine to find something to write about, but stick with me.

First, let’s start with some facts.

According to state data, District 186 had a 4-year high school graduation rate of almost 63% in 2023. Looking out six years, that rate improves to 72%. The four- and six-year rates lagged 25% and 16% behind the state average, respectively. Put differently, four out of every 10 students who started high school in Illinois’s capital didn’t graduate in four years.

Proficiency across ELA, math, and science gives some indication as to why District students may have difficult graduating on time. Not only do district averages continue to lag behind the state, but approximately eight out of every ten students failed to show proficiency in English on 2023 state assessments as well.

Eight out of ten.

I’ll likely be bringing up these and other data as I write about the Board.

For now, let’s let these two images ground the question driving this post: What’s happening with Superintendent Gill’s goals?

During the 1 May 2023 board meeting, Superintendent Gill outlined her six strategic goals for the district:

Goal 1 is to address with urgency the most underperforming elementary, middle and high schools, based on ISBE designations and other data sources such as attendance, assessment (both qualitative and quantitative) data, student conduct and support systems in place. Gill asked that a Board committee be formed to work with her on this goal.

Goal 2 is to examine research surrounding the data processes and the recommendation of retention or social promotion in District 186 schools. In particular, to analyze data surrounding students promoted to high school from 8th grade.

Goal 3 relates to Freshman on Track, a measure that is part of the overall school designation program for the ISBE School Report Card data released each fall. Gill noted this goal will monitor programming and individual growth of students in all high school programs to make sure 9th grade students are on track, as well as monitor student supports, as needed. These supports could include mentoring, tutoring, attendance supports, and so forth.

Goal 4 is to design communication and support structures for students to address graduation rates of all District 186 credit bearing programs.

Goal 5 is to conduct a study surrounding the issues of declining enrollment in district schools, utilize future forecasting of enrollment and analyze its relation to the community’s overall population. Gill noted that the analysis will be presented to the Board of Education by the end of the 2023-2024 school year.

Goal 6, to monitor and communicate with the Board of Education regularly on the hiring, recruitment, promotion, and support for all staff as the district navigates an overall teacher shortage in education. Additionally, Gill reported that as the Consent Decree, which is based on the Desegregation Order of 1976, is supported, she will communicate matters concerning minority recruitment, hiring, support systems and promotions.

In light of graduation and proficiency data, these goals align to pressing needs. Related to Goal 3, state data show 69% of district 9th grade students were on track to graduate in 2023.

In this same presentation of her goals, Gill committed to the Board that she would report progress toward these goals across four future meetings: Nov. 23, 2023; Jan. 16, 2024; March 18, 2024; and June 17, 2024.

Here’s the thing – she never did.

Not only do Board minutes show no record of any progress reports from Gill in those meetings, they also show no indication any board members inquired about this progress.

Eight out of ten don’t show proficiency in reading.

Four out of ten don’t graduate in four years.

Three out of ten aren’t on track to graduate.

No one checked to see if we’re making progress to help turn that around.

19 Aug 14 – District 186 School Board Meeting

As out local daily newspaper’s capacity to cover local news has been greatly reduced, I’ve decided to offer some minimal coverage of our local school board meetings. The plan is simply to offer up things that could go unnoticed for folks who don’t tune in to things like local school board meetings. I’ll likely add context and some commentary where I think it might be helpful.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=ta6clFzjhak%3Fsi%3DZmWrhyJLdhAcNpmo%26start%3D1927
Full video of the 19 Aug. ’24 District 186 School Board Meeting.

Following the Pledge of Allegiance, acknowledgement of board members’ with students who had their first days of school that day, and swearing in this year’s student representative on the Board, Board President Micah Miller turned the meeting over to Superintendent Jennifer Gill for her report.

Gill reported 13,004 registered students as of the meeting time and a 89.03% district attendance rate for the first day.

District Vacancies

Across the district, Gill reported 11 current certified teacher vacancies and 64 vacancies of the 309 paraprofessional positions in the district. Of the paraprofessional openings, 15 of the 111 classroom para positions were vacant and 49 of the 111 one-to-one positions. Gill noted several of the vacancies would be filled by Board approvals at the meeting.

Student First, the District’s student transportation contractor began the year short 13 drivers necessary for all routes, Gill said. To make up for the shortfall, 17 drivers from the District’s ELC would be handling those routes until the ELC opens Aug. 27. By that time Gill said the some of the 17 new hires currently training with First Student would be ready to take over.

Gill said anyone interested in becoming a bus driver ($25/hr) or bus monitor ($16/hr) should reach out to First Student and noted training time for new hires was compensated.

Celebrations

Gill began her celebrations noting the District’s theme for the year, “Level Up 186.” She said it was meant to connect to students’ interest in leveling up in gaming and also “taking their learning to the next level.”

Gill shared photos from welcome back celebrations for teachers and students across the district as well as photos from the “AVID District Path Training: Creating Engaging and Rigorous Classrooms” from Aug. 13 and 14 attended by teachers from Southeast High and Jefferson Middle. Gill said the training was of particular note because all schools are “focusing on AVID” across the District.

Read more about AVID here.

Approval Items

In addition to standard items such as payroll, the following agenda items were unanimously approved by the Board:

  • $55,000 to the National SAM (School Administration Manager) Innovation Project (NSIP) for a site license. The District has already implemented the SAM process with select schools and leaders.
  • $53,000 in federal Title I funds for the contracting of The Thoughtful Classroom as the State Board approved Learning Partner with Dubois Elementary School. Dubois is required to contract a Learning Partner by the State Board because the school earned a Comprehensive rating on its 2023 school report card.

Title I, Part A (Title I) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, as amended by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESEA) provides supplemental financial assistance to school districts for children from low-income families. Its purpose is to provide all children significant opportunity to receive a fair, equitable, and high-quality education, and to close educational achievement gaps by allocating federal funds for education programs and services. Title I allocations to state education agencies and local education agencies (LEAs) are based primarily on annually updated LEA poverty estimates produced by the U.S. Census Bureau. Then, within-LEA allocations to schools are based on school poverty rates, for which a common measure used by LEAs is the number of public school children eligible for free or reduced-price lunch (FRPL). 

The Board approved up to $119,00 for “RSM US LLP to assist with consulting needs for the Fiscal Year 2024 Audit Preparation.”

Board members approved moving the maximum allowable reimbursement amount for staff and board members from $3,000 to $4,000 and increasing the per diem for food to $70. Gill said the increases were necessary to accommodate rising costs of travel and other expenses.

A final item on the agenda was adoption of new district language on personal electronic devices into the student handbook. Discussed and ratified over the course of the last few meetings, this new language moves to a centralized approach to policy and away from the previous freedom of schools to set individual approaches. Of particular interest were the universal consequences listed in the new policy:

  • 1st – Take phone for the day & send to the office, admins call the parent / guardian
  • 2nd – Take phone for the day, Parents/Guardians will be required to pick up the phone before the office closes and take the phone with them. The time should be communicated to the parent of when the offices closes. (If the phone is not picked up, it remains in the office until it is picked up).
  • 3rd – Restorative conversations and classroom detentions and/or administrative detentions will be issued.
  • 4th – Other disciplinary consequences will be issued for repeat offenders and repeat offenders can be required to bring the phone to the academic office with the appropriate grade level administrator each day if parents/legal guardians require their child to have a phone before or after school for safety.

Full minutes of the meeting can be found here.

The next meeting will be September 3 at 6:30 PM in the Board Room, at 1900 West Monroe, Springfield, Illinois.