MATH SCORES RISE

Fountain-Fort Carson School District 8 had all the right excuses for an academic drop-off.

In a time of war, 40 percent of the district’s students were from military families, many with parents in Iraq. Families came and went. Student poverty rates were as high as 57 percent.

It decisively ignored the excuses.

The latest results from the Colorado Student Assessment Program released Tuesday show acrossthe-board gains for the school district that serves families in or near Fort Carson, as well as the town of Fountain. It improved on 21 out of 23 tests, the only district in the Pikes Peak region to do so.

“We track these children, and we’re not happy if they don’t gain a year’s growth in a year’s time,” said Assistant Superintendent Mike Miles.

Each year, CSAP provides a snapshot of learning in Colorado classrooms. The scores influence how a school is rated by state and federal governments, and the tests have changed the education environment.

This year, students statewide showed striking gains in math, and the Pikes Peak region fell in step with that trend.

Overall, the region is home to some of the highest- and poorest-performing schools in the state. Other findings in this year’s results:

- Two new elementary schools, one in Academy School District 20 and the other in Falcon School District 49, scored well above the state average in their inaugural year.

- Some schools that have been low achievers made the biggest gains.

- More than a dozen elementary schools saw dramatic ups and downs within the same building.

Fountain-Fort Carson attributes its success to a curriculum that’s been honed to state standards, routine analysis of its students, and extensive training for teachers, Miles said.

Colorado Education Commissioner William Moloney recently named the district as one of the few in the state that are improving at the rate state officials want.

Eighth-graders at Fountain Middle School — where nearly 31 percent of the students are in the free and reducedprice lunch program, an educational gauge of poverty — improved in writing by more than 35 percent.

PROGRESS IN MATH

Schools across the region and state made widespread improvements in math. State officials say those improvements are due, in part, to a better awareness of the expected standards.

Jo O’Brien, head of learning services for the Colorado Education Department, said about 60 percent of math teachers had at one time been unaware of what students were expected to know and when they should know it.

Manitou Springs School District 14 made some of the biggest gains in math. Seventhgraders improved by 42 percent, from 53 percent proficient or advanced to 75 percent.

In north Colorado Springs and the Falcon area, two schools that opened last fall far exceeded state averages in all subjects. The Da Vinci Academy, in D-20, and Meridian Ranch Elementary, in D-49, scored more than 30 percent higher than the state average in some grades and subjects.

The Da Vinci Academy is a theme school that focuses its curriculum around the arts.

“I’m excited to show that teaching through the arts doesn’t just work for the arts,” said Principal Lew Davis. Ninety-six percent of his third-graders scored proficient or advanced in math.

SOME CRUCIAL GAINS

Several schools made big leaps in achievement, and the biggest gains came from schools where scores were previously far below the rest of the state.

Hunt Elementary School, a Colorado Springs School District 11 school recently considered for possible closure, saw a major improvement in thirdgrade writing, from 22 percent proficient or advanced to 71 percent.

Fifth-grade writing scores at Buena Vista Elementary School, also in D-11, rose from 55 percent proficient or advanced to 100 percent.

In other cases, even sizable gains left much work to be done. Sixth-grade scores at Emerson-Edison Charter Academy increased from 3 percent to 28 percent proficient or advanced.

Consistently high-performing schools generally saw slighter changes. Academy International, a D-20 International Baccalaureate school, saw a few modest ups and downs, yet it still scored among the highest in the state. Students scored 92 percent or more proficient or advanced in eight of nine tested areas.

Schools with higher scores to begin with have a harder time showing a big increase, said Beverly Johnson, Colorado Springs School District 11’s executive director of assessment, research and curriculum alignment. Schools with low scores have a lot more room to increase.

ELEMENTARY UPS, DOWNS

Elementary schools across the Pikes Peak region showed dramatic changes from grade to grade, and those changes spread across socioeconomic boundaries.

In D-20’s Douglass Valley Elementary, for example, fourthgrade scores for writing dropped by almost 31 percent, while fifth-grade scores increased by almost 39 percent.

In Howbert Elementary School, in D-11, third-grade writing scores rose by almost 40 percent, while fourthgrade writing scores dropped by about 16 percent.

Miles, the assistant superintendent in Fountain-Fort Carson, believes teachers at the elementary level have a greater influence on test results than teachers in secondary schools.

Cindy Wenzel, director of assessment for D-20, said a laundry list of factors could contribute to large swings in scores.

At Fountain-Fort Carson, Miles said, classroom success may be especially important. Some students have lost family members killed in the war, and many of those who haven’t worry they will.

An emphasis on meeting the CSAP standards might prevent the additional stress of falling behind in classes, he said.

Staff writer Shari Chaney Griffin

contributed to this report.

THE IMPORTANCE OF CSAP

Colorado Student Achievement Program scores play big roles in the three school accountability systems in Colorado — the federal No Child Left Behind Act’s adequate yearly progress, the state’s School Accountability Reports and the accreditation process.

Under the accountability systems, schools that are not showing improvement or meeting certain benchmarks can be required to offer tutoring or transportation to another school, lose or be limited in how they spend federal funds, or be converted into a charter school.

Decisions about adequate yearly progress should be out in October, and School Accountability Reports are due out in December.