(Radio Iowa) – The Iowa Department of Education has released its annual ranking of schools. The Department’s Information Bureau chief Jay Pennington says it’s the first time the School Performance Profiles had used an updated state plan for school accountability and support. “It includes information such as proficiency rates in key areas such as mathematics, science and language, art. It also includes information about the growth of students year to year,” he says. Thirty-five schools were listed as “in need of comprehensive support and improvement,” the lowest performance level. Pennington says that’s similar to what the previous system showed.

“You’re seeing year to year about the same number of schools, although the makeup or who those schools are identified are different. You know, one thing to point out between the two versions is that we do have 16 schools that are actually exiting that comprehensive or lowest five percent status, which I think those schools would celebrate,” Pennington says . He says there were 15 schools that are carrying over that comprehensive designation from the prior year, and 20 new additional schools that are that now have that status. Pennington says schools are targeted for a particular student group within a school.

“As an example, it could be Hispanic students or students eligible for free or reduced price lunch. But within this new system, we did see a slight increase in the number of schools and percent of schools that are being identified for students with disabilities in particular,” he says. Pennington says more than 93 percent of the 351 schools within the state were identified for having students with disabilities under performing. There were other cases where there was a decrease in the reason why schools were identified.  “So just in contrast, we did see a decline in the number of schools that were identified for students from low-income backgrounds, students that are black or African American, Hispanic or multi-racial,” Pennington says.

He says the report is the beginning of the process and the department has a school improvement team that will work directly with schools on a school improvement plan.
Pennington encourages you to check out your school district ranking and the other information. “It also includes a lot of other rich data beyond the accountability information, so the tool should be really used to not only analyze the results, but also think about engage with district leaders and school leaders about their performance of students within their community,” he says.

You can see the full report at: iaschoolperformance.gov.