St. Landry Parish schools get a C

The St. Landry Parish public school district earned a C in the new and more rigorous state grading system.
And, if the system had remained unchanged, the St. Landry Parish District score would have been a B at 85 performance points with 13.3 points of gain from the 2017 score.
Superintendent Patrick Jenkins said “success is not going to come overnight” for the school district, which he said ranks 51st in the 2018 scores among 70 school districts.
““You can’t take that growth away from us,” Jenkins said the 13.3 points the district grew from 2017 scores under the old scoring system.
“We know that we have things to work on,” he said at a School Board session Thursday called to present the state grades.
East Elementary in Eunice retained an A along with the Magnet School for Cultural Arts in Opelousas.
Eunice High School earned a B, but under the old grading system would have been an A school.Eunice High missed being an A under the new system by 0.3 points.
A key change in the new standards is students are required to achieve standardized test scores at the Mastery level rather than Basic.
The change meant many school districts saw their letter grade and point scores going down this year in the results released Thursday by the state Department of Education.
The education department released scores with the news system and what they would have been under the previous scoring.
Under the 2017 grading, there would have been four A schools: Leonville Elementary, Eunice High, Port Barre Elementary, and Magnet Academy for Cultural Arts.
East Elementary, a perennial leader in the state scoring, would have had a B under the old formula, but has an A under the grading.
An A under the new system is score from 90 to 150. East Elementary scored 93.6. Under the old formula, East had a 106.2 score in 2017, but dropped to 99.6 if the new formula had applied.
East, Eunice High High and MACA also placed high in a new achievement recognition, Equity Honoree.
In order to be named an Equity Honoree, a school must rank in the 90th percentile or greater in one of the following threeareas; Economically Disadvantaged, English Language Learners, or Students with Disabilities, a School Board news release stated.
The district had eight “Top Gains” schools. They are Leonville Elementary, MACA, East Elementary, Eunice Elementary, Krotz Springs Elementary, Palmetto Elementary, Grand Prairie Elementary, and Arnaudville Elementary.
“Top Gains” school is that the school has a progress index of an “A” letter grade and does not require urgent intervention in an area contributing to the calculation of the SPS (school performance score), the news release stated.
The school system’s news release also pointed to other highlights:
— Twenty-four out of 33 (72.7 percent) of St. Landry Parish schools improved their overall academic achievement.
— The graduation rate increased from 66.6 percent in 2016-2017 to 69.1 percent in 2107-2108; an increase of 2.5 percentage points.
On the downside for the parish public schools there were three schools with Fs, which is two more than in 2017. The F schools are Opelousas Junior High School, South Street Elementary and Southwest Elementary, all in Opelousas.
Eight schools received D grades, up from seven in 2017. There are Grolee Elementary, North Elementary, Northeast Elementary, Opelousas High School, Sunset Elementary, Washington Elementary, North Central High and Plaisance Elementary.
Nine schools received B grades. They are Arnaudville Elementary, Eunice Elementary, Grand Prairie Elementary, Krotz Springs Elementary, Leonville Elementary, Palmetto Elementary, Port Barre Elementary, Eunice High and Port Barre High.
Eleven schools received C grades. They are Beau Chene High, Cankton Elementary, Central Middle, Eunice Junior High, Glendale Elementary, Grand Coteau Elementary, Highland Elementary, Lawtell Elementary, Northwest High, Park Vista Elementary and Port Barre Middle.
Twelve schools are labeled Comprehensive Intervention Required because the overall performance is D or F for three years or graduation rates less than 67 percent. Those schools are Grolee Elementary, North Central High, North Elementary, Northeast Elementary, Northwest High, Opelousas Junior High, Opelousas High, Plaisance Elementary, South Street Elementary, Southwest Elementary and Washington Elementary.
Schools labeled as Urgent Intervention Required because of subgroup performance are: Central Middle, Grolee Elementary, Park Vista Elementary, Plaisance Elementary, all in the students with disabilities subgroup. Other schools are Opelousas Junior High, black economically disadvantaged and students with disabilities; South Street Elementary, economically disadvantaged and students with disabilities; and Southwest Elementary, black economically disadvantaged and students with disabilities.
School with Urgent Intervention Required due to out of school suspensions are North Elementary and Opelousas Junior High. Jenkins said in-school suspension programs should alleviate the problem.
Eunice High School Principal Mitch Fontenot noted area high school scores: Eunice, 89.7; Port Barre, 79.9; Beau Chene, 68.4; Northwest 62.6; North Central, 59.8; Opelousas, 59.7; Crowley, 83.8; Iota, 95.6; Rayne, 80.9; Church Point, 80.7; Ville Platte, 73.5; Mamou, 80.2; Pine Prairie, 78.9; Basile, 87; and Jennings, 87.6.
— St. Landry Parish pre-kindergarten programs were also among those recognized by the education department. Six pre-kindergarten programs earned an excellent rating in the 2017-2018 school year; increasing by five from the 2016-2017 school year. Schools having an “Excellent” rating in pre-kindergarten programs include East Elementary, Glendale Elementary, Grolee Elementary, Lawtell Elementary, North Elementary, and Park Vista Elementary. Grolee Elementary pre-kindergarten program also earned a spot on the Louisiana “Top Gains” list.
The state department reported, “As schools respond to higher expectations, the distribution of school performance scores has shifted modestly. The result is 13 percent of schools statewide received an “A” grade; 31 percent of schools statewide received a “B” grade; 30 percent of schools statewide received a “C” grade; 14 percent of schools statewide received a “D” grade; and 12 percent of schools statewide received an “F” grade.
“More than 500 struggling schools must submit an improvement plan to the state. This year, 276 schools struggled persistently overall and are now required to submit a plan for comprehensive intervention. An additional 226 schools struggled persistently with one or more groups of students and/or school discipline and are required to submit a plan for urgent intervention. In total, school systems will be required to submit plans for 502 schools. These plans will be reviewed by the state for approval and funding support in the 2018-2019 school year.”