St. Susanna Sets The Standard For County ISTEP Scoring

Click to view the article at flyergroup.com.

By Ryan Palencer

With ISTEP scores slightly declining throughout the state from last year, Hendricks County schools showed that it truly does take an entire community to educate a child.

Saint Susanna School in Plainfield set the standard. The school achieved perfect passing scores in two grades — fourth and eighth. In addition to those scores, the third-graders had 90 percent of students pass both the Engish/language and the math portions of the exam, with all of those students passing the math. All of the fifth-grade students passed the math and 90 percent passed both. All of the seventh-graders also passed the math, with 80 percent passing both. It has been a gradual improvement for St. Susanna.

“If you look at the last three years, we have improved every year,” said Tina Davis, who is in her third year as principal at St. Susanna. “My first year, we scored a 90.8 percent. In my second year, we went up to a 93 percent and this year 95 percent passed.”

Davis thinks that shows the importance of her staff and students.

“We don’t teach the test,” she said. “It’s a great credit to our staff. It shows the dedication of our staff and that our teachers and students are working hard.”

Overall, state numbers showed about 71 percent of students passing in English/language and 74 percent passing in math. Statewide, English/language scores dropped 1 percentage point at every grade level except for 10th — which remained constant from last year. Math and science scores were mixed with changes from two-point declines to two-point increases.

Kingsway Christian School in Avon was also above average. The school had better than 90 percent of all sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders pass both sections of the test. All of the eighth-graders passed the math portion.

Bethesda Christian Schools in Brownsburg also did well. All of the fifth-graders passed both sections of the exam, while all of the third- and sixth-graders passed the English/language portion. Also in Brownsburg, St. Malachy School had at least 86 percent of all students who took the exam pass both subjects. All of the fourth-graders passed English/language, while all of the seventh-graders passed math.

The public schools in the county also did well, staying above the state average in most subjects.

At North West Hendricks Schools, at least 87 percent of third-, fourth-, and fifth-graders passed both subjects. In the seventh grade, 92 percent of students passed the math portion. Though the number of students passing declined as the grade level increased, the school as a whole stayed above the average.

The Brownsburg Community School Corporation also stayed above the state average. On the math section, 88 percent of all sixth-graders and 90 percent of all seventh-graders passed.

The Avon Community School Corporation had 91 percent of all seventh-graders pass math, while 87 percent of fifth-graders passed English/language. At White Oak Elementary School, 85 percent of third-graders passed both, while 82 percent of students at Cedar Elementary School passed both.

The Danville Community School Corporation had 96 percent of seventh-grade students pass the math portion of the exam. In the eighth and 10th grades, 87 percent passed the math section in both grades. Also at Danville, greater than 80 percent of students in every class passed the English/language portion.

The Plainfield Community School Corporation had 93 percent of fifth- and seventh-graders, as well as 94 percent of sixth-graders, pass the math portion. Overall, Plainfield had no less than 75 percent of students pass both sections in every grade level.

“(The math scores) were really good scores that we are proud of,” Plainfield Assistant Superintendent Mary Giesting said. “It shows the dedication of the students, teachers, and parents. It also shows that the curriculum is working. We feel really good about what we are doing with the lower levels and what they will do in the future. This is a community that values education.”

The Mill Creek Community School Corporation also performed well — particularly at the elementary level. At Mill Creek East Elementary, 84 percent of students passed both portions of the test, with 93 percent passing English/language and 89 percent passing math. At Mill Creek West Elementary, 85 percent of fifth-graders, 91 percent of fourth-graders and 95 percent of third-graders passed the English/language portion. Also at Mill Creek West, 89 percent of fourth-graders and 87 percent of fifth-graders passed the math section.

Mill Creek West Elementary Principal Jeremy Baugh said he thinks the success in English was due to early experience for his students.

“For three years, we have been working to promote early literacy,” Baugh said. “The third-graders this year are the first group to pass through it.”

The early literacy training, combined with the in-class lessons, Baugh said, has led to the success on the English portions of the test.

As for the math sections, Mill Creek has a three-tiered model for students which works as a safety net for students who struggle or fall behind. The work from the textbook combines with an ‘excellerated’ program and a ‘power standards’ program to give students an advantage.

Three years ago, Baugh said, the Mill Creek scores were in the 70 percent range for students passing.

Saint Susanna NCA Goals

This site is designed for 1024x468 or higher screen resolution with Mozilla Firefox as the preferred internet browser.