Schools
Plum School District Makes AYP, Pivik Misses PSSA Reading Target
Plum Borough School District officials are overall happy with the district's progress, but one elementary school's economically disadvantaged subgroup missed reading targets.
A Pivik Elementary subgroup has not met reading targets of the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment test.
The school administration team presented preliminary PSSA scores and observations at the school board's education committee meeting on Wednesday night. , , and , , and elementary schools met targets in all categories.
However, subgroup did not meet targets in reading with only 55.1 percent of students scoring proficient or higher in reading. The school has been put on a warning by the state.
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The district as a whole made adequate yearly progress—AYP.
This year's state target was to have at least 81 percent of district students proficient in reading and 78 percent proficient in math—the goals are 11 percent higher than last year's in both categories.
The targets are set to jump to 91 percent in reading and 89 percent in math in 2013.
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The high school, which , significantly improved its scores this year—84.9 percent proficient in reading and 71.8 percent in math. The school made AYP using the "safe harbor" provision, in which a school must move 10 percent of students in its two lowest performing subgroups into proficient or above. About 61 percent of students were proficient in math last year.
High school Principal Ryan Kociela said students scored historical highs in every subject.
"I'm proud of the improvements we've made, but we want to strive for that excellence," he said.
Officials said building principals would be analyzing data with teachers and come up with strategies to improve PSSA scores. Those plans will be presented to the school board in the next two months.
"We've made some significant improvements over the last year, and it's something to be celebrated," district Superintendent Timothy Glasspool said. "We have a school on the warning list, but we are going to work on that."
We'll have more in depth preliminary scores over the next few days. Check back.
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