Thursday, September 20, 2018

MDE Delays School Ratings at Last Minute

Well, JJ was going to post the 2017 ratings for public schools in Mississippi at 12:01 PM today.  The key word in that sentence is "was."  MDE postponed releasing the ratings until October.  MDE issued this statement:


The Mississippi State Board of Education (SBE) voted today to delay until October consideration of approval of letter grades for the 2017-18 school year for schools and districts based on Mississippi’s A-F accountability system. Statewide accountability data sent under embargo to school district superintendents and members of the media on Sept. 17 are unofficial. The embargo was set to lift at noon today. However, because the SBE did not approve the grades, they are not the official grades of school and district performance. School districts and members of the media are advised to wait until October to report SBE-approved grades. 
The SBE voted in August to establish a temporary rule to reset the baseline scores for establishing accountability grades for schools that have a 12th grade. The reset would address the lack of comparability to growth scores in prior years. The SBE will decide today whether to make this temporary rule permanent. The new Mississippi Succeeds Report Card, which was set to launch today, will not be published until the SBE approves accountability grades. 

Accountability grades are based, in part, on how well students perform and progress from year to year on the Mississippi Academic Assessment Program (MAAP) tests for English language arts (ELA) and Mathematics. These tests are aligned to the Mississippi College and Career Ready Standards and are administered annually to students in grades 3-8 and in high school. Overall, students showed statistically significant gains in both ELA and Mathematics from 2016-17 to 2017-18.
The accountability system places an emphasis on the progress students make in ELA and Mathematics from year to year, particularly the lowest performing 25 percent of students, and factors in how well students perform on science tests in grades 5 and 8. Accountability grades for high schools and districts include the four-year graduation rate, student performance on Biology, U.S. History and ACT tests, and student participation and performance in advanced coursework such as Advanced Placement and dual credit/dual enrollment courses.

The media received the results earlier this week after agreeing to embargo publishing the ratings until noon today. Come back next month. 

39 comments:

Anonymous said...

If media have the numbers now I hope they will report any changes when they are "official" next month. Something smells fishy!

Anonymous said...

Ratings, no ratings. Who cares. Kids that graduate who can't read or write is all you need to know.

The schools in MS allow kids to retest until they get the grade they want. They also have "bell curve" grading so your A student may actually have done well enough to get a C+ or B-.

Parents are certainly to blame but how does the school expect the parents to help when the school district let them down too. You can't teach what you don't know.

Anonymous said...

I guess "the dog ate our ratings" has been used too much.

Anonymous said...

I thank God everyday that my kids attend school in Madison instead of Rankin. I’d enroll them in JPS before I had anything to do with Rankin County schools

Anonymous said...

Like mentioned above, can't wait to see the analysis of the original scores and the new ones.

Anonymous said...

1:38 Ditto... But maybe not JPS.

Anonymous said...

September 20, 2018 at 1:38 PM = Fake comment

Anonymous said...

@1:38pm We in Rankin County are EXTREMELY grateful that you live in Madison County too! Thank you for your self-righteous post. It makes me more proud to be from Rankin County.

Anonymous said...

Wonder which school districts got whacked and decided to put political pressure on MDE to “go back and cipher some more?”

Anonymous said...

KF - Do you have access to the original grade list? And will you (please) post about any changes made when the "official" list is released?

I'm assuming Rankin County schools (and maybe others) continued to fall and they're trying to find a way to make it not seem as bad.

Anonymous said...

With 140+ school districts it would be difficult for one single school district or even a handful of districts to disrupt the process.

Anonymous said...

I thought changing grades was illegal? Sheesh, it used to be that an "A" was an "A" and an "F" was an "F"......so now their changing the whole system? Wow. NO academic integrity whatsoever.....which means that kids are unequivocally not learning, regardless of a piece of paper saying "passing" or "graduating". Mississippi is in TROUBLE.

Anonymous said...

Madison can and will disrupt the process if they are not an A district.

Anonymous said...

@4:12 they change the process EVERY YEAR EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR. These scores are not indicative of student performance or teacher performance.

Anonymous said...

Is this just one more reason we should run Carey Wright's ass out of this state?

But, if we did, we'd just pull a boner like Madison County just did and hire somebody whose ass just got run out of Tennessee.

Anonymous said...

@4:27 Agreed. How is this legal? Aren't they obligated to the feds in some way to meet certain standards? Seriously. You can't just make things up, change the "rules", etc. to qualify poor performance to continue to get funding, which apparently is the game.

Anonymous said...

3:01 You know what they say about people that assume - actually it is Corinth that apparently has a problem with the ratings. (Check Mississippi Today article.) Thanks for playing.

Anonymous said...

Nothing a few million dollars of software can’t fix.

Anonymous said...

It won’t go out until Rankin and Madison get A’s. And they may holdout for the airport takeover also.

Anonymous said...

How many PhDs does it take to spit out a score card?

Anonymous said...

Why don't they just let Tennessee annex Corinth?

Anonymous said...

wtok.com has list displayed

meridian projected to be an F

Sho Nuff said...

An A in this state, very well could be a C level or worse grade in one of the other 50. This state needs competition in the education field. How can reasonable people continue to through money at a failing system? Why, do the elected officials continue to be extorted in to increasing funding, when said funds, fail to enhance the situation? I, don't have the answers needed to rectify this outrageous system, but surely someone can remedy this disease that has plagued our young people for too long.

Anonymous said...

Great comments, keep em coming

Anonymous said...

Lamar County and Petal are “A” districts.

Hattiesburg is a “D” district, with Hattiesburg High School receiving an “F” grade.

Anonymous said...

5:14 Tell me it isn’t so. My hometown Meridian?

Anonymous said...

Sho nuff: proof read your post. If that’s the best you have, read a book and try again. iRONYu

Demographic Reality - Like It Or Not said...

When we discuss large, failed cities in this country, we are often asked to consider which political party has operated at the helm of government for the past twenty years. And the reality is always the same.

Likewise, with failing or near-failing schools, which race holds most of the jobs in the District (including the superintendent) and which race holds the largest percentage of students in the district?

Ignore that at your own peril or blame it on whatever makes you feel good. Then ask for more money and move on....

Anonymous said...

Corinth school Supe sued MDE saying the standards "aren't fair".....I guess he thinks he's the king that decides what reality is. You can't make this stuff up.

Anonymous said...

Spot on comment about the PhD's. Those used to be reserved for scientists and researchers. Now they come in cereal boxes but you aren't fit to run a school without one somehow.

Anonymous said...

https://www.wtok.com/content/news/Meridian-Philadelphia-listed-as-failing-school-districts-in-projected-Miss-ratings-493875131.html

Sho Nuff said...

@10:57, if Obama can have 57, or ever how many he said, can't I have 51? I was under the influence of my medication, preparing for bed. It's a wonder I was that coherent. My humble apologies, 10:57, I shall refrain from posting under the influence in the future.

Anonymous said...

There are a lot of PhDs in Madison, just not one running the School District.

Anonymous said...

What you are calling PhDs are really EDDs which is a fake way for folks in education to call themselves Doctor. An EDD is easier to get that most real year college degrees.

Kingfish said...

Don't think I'm not tempted to post them.

Anonymous said...

Speaking of Dr. Carey Wright, she lives up there in Madison County, in the Cluckstadt. Maybe she's protecting her investment with test scores. A little home cooking per se. Don't think it hasn't happened before.

Anonymous said...

@ KF, what are the repercussions if you did post them?

Anonymous said...

The delay is simply to provide cover for those superintendents whose ratings my be going down. They have to have time to cover their rears, come up with excuses, and make some quick changes so they can say it's all being handled.

Trying To Keep Up.. said...

I never understand the flow when Kingfish starts talking to himself in posts.



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