State, Area School Districts Get Bad "No Child" Report Cards

The State Board of Education's annual report cards Tuesday found 82 percent of school districts and 66 percent of schools failed to make adequate progress last year. Both District 300 and District 158 failed to meet what State Superintendent Christopher Koch said were "punitive" and "one-size fits all," federal standards.

The No Child Left Behind Act requires states to measure each public school's and district's achievement against rising standards in reading and mathematics until every kid meets them by 2014.  That's not happening, though.  For instance, only 11 high schools in the whole state managed to meet the far lower 2011 standard.

Indeed, the number of schools failing to make adequate progress went up in Illinois this year even though state goals stayed the same as last year. The benchmark was 85 percent of students at or above grade level in reading and math but 713 districts and 3,786 schools didn't manage to get there.

Just looking at local high schools, in District 300, at Jacobs only 63.7 percent met the reading standard and 66.9 percent the math.  At Dundee-Crown the equivalent numbers were 46.9 and 46.8. Meanwhile, over in District 158, Huntley High students clocked 61.9 percent meeting reading standards and 66.4 meeting math.

District and individual school report cards for D300 can be examined here:

http://webprod.isbe.net/ereportcard/publicsite/searchBySchool.aspx?searchby=districtName&language=english&year=2011&keyword=300&type=card&rcds=310453000

D158's district and individual school report cards are located here:

http://webprod.isbe.net/ereportcard/publicsite/searchBySchool.aspx?searchby=districtName&language=english&year=2011&keyword=158&type=card&rcds=440631580

In theory if schools and school districts don't meet AYP by 2014 the federal government could step in to "fix" them. But Illinois isn't the only state having trouble. About two thirds have asked for waivers from some NCLB mandates. Illinois is merely one of the few that hasn't gotten one yet. Koch said the problem is the state's schedule for starting statewide teacher evaluations. Illinois law calls for a graduated phase-in with a 2016 deadline. The feds want the teacher evaluations to start faster.

In the pics:  Even though they didn't make "Adequate Yearly Progress" both District 300 and District 158 made measurable improvement in 2011, although D158's overall numbers were mixed.