Staff writer
Marion County school districts had numerous schools and grade levels achieve the Standard of Excellence for performance on Kansas state assessments in reading, math, and science for the 2010-11 school year, according to a report released Tuesday by the Kansas Department of Education.
Standard of excellence awards recognize achievement that exceeds basic curriculum standards established by KDOE.
Grade-level standard of excellence awards for each Marion County district are presented in the table accompanying this article.
Standard of excellence status is awarded to grade levels that meet or exceed state criteria for the designation.
Building awards are computed for all grades physically housed in a particular school building, and therefore vary from district to district.
USD 408
Marion-Florence received building awards in reading for all three district schools.
MES and Marion Middle School received building awards for math, while Marion High School lost its designation from 2009-10.
MES improved from 2009-10 to achieve a building-wide award for science.
USD 410
Hillsboro received building-wide awards for reading and math at all three district facilities, maintaining their performance levels from 2009-10.
Compared with 2009-10, Hillsboro Elementary School achieved the standard of excellence for science, while Hillsboro Middle School did not maintain the science standard it had achieved.
USD 398
Peabody-Burns received a building-wide excellence designation in reading for Peabody Junior/Senior High School, adding eighth and 11th grades to grade level awards compared to 2009-10. Peabody Elementary School earned a reading award in 2009-10, but did not repeat the award for 2010-2011.
No building-wide awards were achieved in math or science.
USD 397
2010-11 is the first academic year in which all Centre grade levels have been housed in one facility. Centre received building awards in reading and math.
USD 411
Goessel was the only district in the county to achieve building level standard of excellence awards in all three assessment areas. Goessel Elementary School and Goessel Junior High/High School each received awards for reading, math, and science.
The Department of Education administers reading and math assessments to students from third grade through 12th grade.
Science assessments are only conducted on one grade level in each school classification – fourth grade in elementary, seventh grade in middle school, and 11th grade in high school. Building awards for science are subject to greater variations from year-to-year than reading and math because of the smaller number of students tested.