High School Test Scores

[mdd88jd]

Thanks SGB...., although the comment about changes on the school board scared me a little!.....I know I didn't agree with you about the scheduling change...but, I hope you know that the disagreement was principled. It is interesting that since the change over, we have been asked by principals to allow students to take more than two P.E.s per year and we have dropped our local requirement that the student take four social studies prior to graduation. But, I really hope the schedule change positively affects our students. In talking with other counties, the results are mixed. I have always thought that the schedule really did not matter, it is the quality of the leadership in the school and the teachers that really matter. In any event, I appreciate your involvement and hopefully, we can work together to continue to build outstanding schools in Walton County.

 

[melscuba]

Thanks SGB...., although the comment about changes on the school board scared me a little!.....I know I didn't agree with you about the scheduling change...but, I hope you know that the disagreement was principled. It is interesting that since the change over, we have been asked by principals to allow students to take more than two P.E.s per year and we have dropped our local requirement that the student take four social studies prior to graduation. But, I really hope the schedule change positively affects our students. In talking with other counties, the results are mixed. I have always thought that the schedule really did not matter, it is the quality of the leadership in the school and the teachers that really matter. In any event, I appreciate your involvement and hopefully, we can work together to continue to build outstanding schools in Walton County.

As far as block vs. traditional. Here in Roswell, our middle school works on a block schedule, and our high school the traditional. The scores are strong in both schools. There is a lot of debate as to what works best. It seems to be more personal opinion. I agree, it seems to be quality of leadership and the teachers that really matter. I did notice the point of scores being higher in both middle schools than in SWHS. This is what prompted my original question. In two years, on paper anyway, it looks like kids who were scoring in the high 80th and low 90th percentile were dropping to the 40's OUCH! It looks like a major breakdown between schools. I can say right off the bat, I am impressed with the open dialogue... this is how change happens. The direction SWHS is taking for that change to happen needs to become apparent.

 

[rheffron]

What is the cost to take either the act or sat? Would it makes sense to make it mandatory?

 

[mdd88jd]

Drop in Scores from Middle to High Schooll

As far as block vs. traditional. Here in Roswell, our middle school works on a block schedule, and our high school the traditional. The scores are strong in both schools. There is a lot of debate as to what works best. It seems to be more personal opinion. I agree, it seems to be quality of leadership and the teachers that really matter. I did notice the point of scores being higher in both middle schools than in SWHS. THis is what prompted my original question. In two years, on papar anyway, it looks like kids who were scoring in the high 80th and low 90th percentile were dropping to the 40's OUCH! It looks like a major breakdown between schools. I can say right off the bat, I am impressed with the open dialogue... this is how change happens. The direction SWHS is taking for that change to happen needs to become apparent.

That drop in scores has been going on for some time in all areas of the county, not just south Walton. I can't explain it. My best guess is that it is easier to teach the FCAT subjects (reading, writing, math and science) in elementary and middle schools because the state does not mandate much else that must be taught. In high schools, we have mandatory curriculum for many subjects outside FCAT so I suspect it is less intense in High Schools than in middle schools. Just a guess. My brother has been an administrator in both settings, need to ask him that question.

 

[Jdarg]

Yes, Walton County is going through a similar transition. SWHS is relatively new, so it's kind of going through a "growing up" transition too. Its first year it had many students that other schools didn't want, so that was a tough year or two. Since then we've had a new principal that put a stop to that. So now most of the kids that go there are from South Walton and grew up together. For the most part it's a good group of kids and they have relatively few behavior issues. As the school has evolved, they've been able to add AP classes and focus more on the education of the kids. Sports is big here too so that gets attention too.

I would have hoped that the test scores would start to improve, but so far, they haven't really. I think it's just a matter of time. Now that we're back to a traditional schedule, and more parents are pushing for better academics, I think we'll eventually start to see test score improvement.

Improving the FCAT scores needs to include and start with the elementary and middle schools too. The middle schools are really starting to take off here. Seaside has always had good scores and now Emerald Coast (also relatively new) is doing really well too. The students that are just now coming into the high school are the ones that have had an improved education at Emerald Coast and Seaside. Perhaps we'll see a rise in high school FCAT scores as these kids go to the high school.

Strictly based on the students that I know, most seem to take both tests. Unfortunately many of them wait until 12th grade to take the tests. I haven't evaluated the SAT test taker numbers lately, but perhaps they include the lower classmen in the count? Many of our students end up going to NWFSC after they graduate and it's not a requirement that they take the SAT or ACT to get in. It is a requirement that they take it if they want Bright Futures money. There's another big perk that Florida gives their kids, Bright Futures scholarships. Look that up and I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

BTW - the dual enrollment, collegiate high school and virtual schools are all free. Students can earn a lot of free college credit before they even graduate from HS.

As parents we all have to continue to push for better classes and higher expectations. We have to impress this upon the school administration and the school board of the county. As the expectations of the schools changes I would hope that the school board composition and expectations will change too. We've got some good people on the board, but I think the county is due for some changes. We'll see improvement as things evolve.

All good points as usual SGB and Mark!

I know teachers and administrators read this message board, and I want them to remember that while we want to see improvements in our schools, it does not mean that we are looking to criticize all the time- we just expect excellence for our kids and want to help get us there. The parents working the hardest for our schools are also the biggest cheerleaders for the school system- we see the benefit of having a strong public school system, because without it, we have a weak community. Citizens that want to get our economic mojo back around here need to get behind our school system- not only for the current residents, but to help attract future residents, like Melscuba. Sometimes moving to a new area is forced, but in this area it is more of a "lifestyle choice, so people look at school quality when making decisions about moving to the beach. High quality schools have tentacles that reach into all parts of the community, so asking for excellence is not too much to ask, IMO.

We are one of the families that moved here because of a job instead of just "wanting to move to the beach and making something happen"- it was a great job opportunity, and it just happened to be at the beach. So- we knew coming in that we would have to be involved and make some enhancements to our kids educations, which we have done. This year, our junior will be taking 3 AP courses plus Latin II on virtual school, 2 other academic courses, and hopefully the leadership, art 3, or speech class. SWHS is small, but there are some quality electives taught by great teachers.

I can honestly say that we love SWHS, and we will continue to be behind our school 100%.

 

[SGB]

Thanks SGB...., although the comment about changes on the school board scared me a little!.....I know I didn't agree with you about the scheduling change...but, I hope you know that the disagreement was principled. It is interesting that since the change over, we have been asked by principals to allow students to take more than two P.E.s per year and we have dropped our local requirement that the student take four social studies prior to graduation. But, I really hope the schedule change positively affects our students. In talking with other counties, the results are mixed. I have always thought that the schedule really did not matter, it is the quality of the leadership in the school and the teachers that really matter. In any event, I appreciate your involvement and hopefully, we can work together to continue to build outstanding schools in Walton County.

I enjoy a healthy debate and disagreeing on an issue is not enough for me to decide that you're not a good board member. There are other members on the board that I think could be cycled out. My personal opinion. I agree that the type of schedule is a minor issue compared to quality of teachers and leadership. However, I believe the block schedule has too many negatives compared to its positives. My current 8th grader would never have been able to survive trying to learn more than 60 minutes of information a day per class when he gets to 9th grade. He would have been way behind and lost in class after a month.

Regarding the things that have been asked for in changing to a traditional schedule - I'm sure that we're going to have a few years of this weird class scheduling due to the fact that some of the kids were out of sequence for their classes due to what you could do with your schedule under block. Once those kids graduate, I would hope that the traditional schedule gets everyone on track and things run smoothly and hopefully everyone learns more. However, just because block schedule allowed for certain things, like having some of the sports teams practice for a quarter of their school day, I would hope that we aren't making allowances to continue some of these practices with the traditional schedule. This is just an example and I have no clue what the problems are that are being encountered that would require someone to take more than 2 PEs a year.

There is a cost for the SAT and ACTs. I think it's about $45 for the SAT. If you're eligible for free lunches, then it's my understanding that you can get the fee waived. As jdarg said in her post, there is an active group of parents working with the kids to make sure they are taking the tests at the correct time and making sure that $$ isn't stopping someone from taking the test or considering college. I doubt there are too many schools that have this level of involvement from parents.

SWHS has the potential to have an academic reputation equal to our closest example, Niceville. I'm looking forward to the day we can look at our scores and see that they're on par with Niceville. We'll never have everything Niceville has just due to the numbers, but the small number of students at SWHS also has many huge advantages.

 

[SGB]

All good points as usual SGB and Mark!

I know teachers and administrators read this message board, and I want them to remember that while we want to see improvements in our schools, it does not mean that we are looking to criticize all the time- we just expect excellence for our kids and want to help get us there.

You're right jdarg, I would hate for anyone to think that we're looking to criticize all the time. To get change for the better you have to recognize what's not working, so often, that's the focus. I can honestly say that I have been very impressed with all the teachers my child had in 9th grade. And I've been very impressed with many of the other teachers I've met. Excellence in the schools will need to involve all of us working together to get there. The parents only know a small slice of information. The teachers know a huge slice of the information and really are the key.

 

[WCTA]

Since we are looking at the average test scores for SAT in Walton County, why are you showing us top-ranked college entrance requirements? Shouldn't we be looking at scores of acceptance for schools such as the ones a Walton County student might attend, like FSU, UF, UCF, UofM, etc? I'd bet that less than one percent of people who take the SAT go to all of those schools you listed, so if you want to use them as a reference grade, you should probably take only the highest SAT score for all of Walton County to see if they would be accepted on score alone. Just my $.03

I posted those schools due to the statement made by beachmouse:

As for the percent meeting standards in 10th grade reading, this year's FCAT had 61% listed, which is still not ideal but not too far from what are seen as the good general enrollment high schools in the Panhandle that have students that regularly send kids to Ivies (Gulf Breeze, Niceville, Navarre)

One of our sons attended Duke and I can assure you that an SAT score of 1490 would not have gotten him there. He worked hard, and we set a high level of expectation.

Please see that the ACT scores for surrounding schools are substantially higher than the average of 19.8 in WCSD. I served on a school board and can only say that it will take many years to change those averages under any school board or administration. It will take a unified will of parents, teachers and mentors to raise the level of expectation and results.

We need to have a stable, predictable revenue source for education in Florida. The legislature in Florida does not seem to have the political will to fix a definite problem - widely fluctuating, unpredictable revenue sources.

Just my .02 cents worth.

 

[Jdarg]

We have some really great parents here-

parents of incoming freshman jumped in and worked their tails off during our project with the juniors this past spring. They didn't have any kids at SWHS yet, but they saw the importance of preparation for the future beginning in 9th grade. They should all get giant gold stars.

 

[Bob Wells]

My son graduated from SWHS and was there from the day it opened. During that time he was there with 2 different principals and 1 vice principal. His teachers were excellent and seemed to excel. I was impressed with SWHS and they have improved every year.