Typically it’s pretty easy to analyze state assessment scores, by comparing them to years past. But last spring the state issued new shorter tests based on different standards or expectations.

I’m going to take my time analyzing the data and talking to people before drawing any hard conclusions, but I wanted to make the data available. Below are some graphs and comparisons.

If you want to see how you’re student’s school did, check out the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction’s thorough Web site.

Middle and elementary school students took what’s now called the Measurement of Student Progress (MSP) while 10th-graders took the High School Proficiency Exams (HSPE). They’re both essentially shorter versions of the WASL.

I will point out as of now, all incoming 10th-grade students for the class of 2013 must pass all four sections of the HSPE to earn a diploma. State Superintendent Randy Dorn asked for that to change, but it hasn’t happened yet.

While I don’t want to reach any hard conclusions right now, I will point out that Renton appears to have followed state trends overall. However, many of its scores fall below the state average.

Overall, middle school students improved their scores with the new tests while high school students and fifth-graders (the last year students are in Renton elementary schools) saw declines.

Though still below state average, Renton eighth-graders made significant progress in closing the gap with the state average this year.

I’ll have information about government sanctions and how they could affect the schools when I get back from vacation.

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This data represents percentages of students who passed the exams.

HIGH SCHOOL DATA (2008-2009; 2009-2010)

WA STATE 10th-GRADERS
Reading 81.2, 78.8 (-2.4)
Writing 86.7, 85.9 (-0.8)
Math 45.4, 41.6 (-3.8)
Science 38.8, 44.7 (-5.9)

RENTON SCHOOL DISTRICT
Reading 81.1, 73.7 (-7.4)
Writing 85.3, 77.7 (-7.6)
Math 40.4, 34.0 (-6.4)
Science 41.1, 38.9 (-2.2)

RENTON HIGH SCHOOL
Reading 74.6, 69.1 (-5.5)
Writing 76.9, 70.1 (-6.8)
Math 28.0, 22.1 (-5.9)
Science 25.1, 28.1 (+3.0)

HAZEN HIGH SCHOOL
Reading 87.0, 80.1 (-6.9)
Writing 87.1, 83.0 (-4.1)
Math 50.1, 50.5 (+0.4)
Science 47.5, 48.7 (+1.2)

LINDBERGH HIGH SCHOOL
Reading 82.1, 76.3 (-5.8)
Writing 91.8, 84.3 (-7.5)
Math 45.0, 36.8 (-8.2)
Science 59.0, 46.3 (-12.7)

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WA STATE EIGHTH-GRADERS (2008-2009; 2009-2010)
Reading 67.5, 69.2 (+1.7)
Math 50.8, 51.5 (+0.7)

RENTON SCHOOL DISTRICT EIGHTH-GRADERS
Reading 59.7, 66.6  (+6.9)
Math 38.9, 47.4 (+8.5)

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WA STATE FIFTH-GRADERS (2008-2009; 2009-2010)
Reading 74.0, 69.5 (-4.5)
Math 61.9, 53.6 (-8.3)

RENTON SCHOOL DISTRICT FIFTH-GRADERS
Reading 69.6, 65.3 (-4.3)
Math 50.1, 43.8 (-6.3)

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The below charts represent percentage of pass rates for the Renton School District for the past three years.

Adam Swinney, new eighth-grade language arts teacher, talks to other new teachers at the Renton Chamber of Commerce 21st Annual New Teacher Breakfast.

About 40 new teachers were welcomed to the Renton School District with a breakfast hosted by the Chamber of Commerce Aug. 26.
Business leaders fund and participate in the annual tradition to support the incoming staff and show their appreciation.
The new teachers come from several walks of life from being a recent college graduate to moving to the district from out of state.
One such teacher is Adam Swinney, the new eighth-grade language arts teacher at Dimmitt Middle School, who moved to Renton after teaching high school English for three years in the Chicago Public School system.
Bob Bridge surprised the teachers with $50 each to help offset costs when purchasing new materials for the classroom. It was paid for by the National Automobile Dealers Charitable Foundation.
The event was catered by Renton Technical College and featured keynote speaker Dean Allen, CEO of the Seattle-based McKinstry, a consulting and construction company.

Seahawks athletes are expected to visit multiple Renton schools over the next month to give recognition to teachers and to teach kids about healthy living and exercise.

Hazen High School business teacher Mark Sabo was recognized Aug. 27, and Friday, Sept. 3, Highlands Elementary School kindergarten teacher Lynne Morgan will also be recognized as one of the “Heroes in the Classroom.”

The program, which is also in place in Atlanta and Chicago, includes a presentation during a school assembly, a team jersey for award winners, two tickets to a Seahawks game, and on-field passes to see the game up close and personal. Seahawks players won’t be at this event, but staff will.

In addition to those two visits, Players do plan to visit Maplewood Heights, Campbell Hill and Tiffany Park elementary schools as a part of the Play 60 program, in which athletes encourage kids to exercise 60 minutes daily. They also talk about doing well in school and bullying.

Maplewood is the only school with a set date, 10 a.m., Sept. 14. I plan to go to one of them to write a more in depth story about the Seahawks program.

Compliments of spokesman Randy Matheson, I now have a beautiful version of the Renton School District final 2010-2011 academic calendar.

It’s printed and taped to my cubicle wall, and I recommend parents do the same.

FINAL Calendar 2010 2011

Sorry kiddoes, school starts Wednesday, Sept. 1.
Congratulations parents, another year of watching your children learn and grow is about to start.
All seventh-, eighth-, 10th-, 11th- and 12th-graders get an extra day to play, starting class Sept. 2, while they give the incoming sixth- and ninth-graders a chance to explore their new middle and high schools without the older classmates.
Most kids have already had class registration and ASB sign up days.
Don’t forget that there are new lunch prices this year. Elementary meals are $2.25. Middle school lunches cost $2.75, and high school meals are $3
Neighboring districts Kent and Tukwila also start Sept. 1, but Bellevue started classes Aug. 30, and Seattle starts Sept. 9.

Apparently, we have the only working online copy of the 2010-2011 calendar. The Renton School District posted a prettier one, but it doesn’t seem to be working.

10-11 Calendar REA R 3-18-10

P.S. I’m back to blogging too, after a busy summer of festivals and annexation talks.

Two recent stories I wrote about science programs show two sides of a coin, and I want to draw that connection for readers.

A month ago I wrote about the horticulture program getting a timely axe with Black River High School. I want to juxtapose that story with a new one I wrote about an exciting new environmental science class at Hazen High School. (Though the horticulture program wasn’t at Hazen, it has several Hazen students.)

One program is closing, while another one is opening. It’s all under the same vision, increasing rigor. When you read them together, it shows more clearly what the district is changing in the science program.

An unanswered question I had after the horticulture program closed is what the district plans to replace it with. By several standards it was a successful class.

Teresa Coda, the Hazen science chair, mentioned that teachers looked at several courses including astronomy. (Hazen chose environmental science because the new solar panels fit well into the class.) The class, which both sparks the interest of students and maybe even federal grants, is a probably good picture of what’s going to be coming.

Questions are arising about proper legal procedure for closing a public school in Washington, after the district announced the closure of Black River High School.
There are a lot of questions I plan to ask on this issue, but I thought for now that I’d give readers a look at the Revised Code of Washington.
If this code applies, the Board of Directors will have to host public hearings over a 90-day time period, before voting. Public hearing notices will need to be published in a newspaper, which in their case is the Seattle Times and the Renton Reporter.
The Renton School District hasn’t run a public hearing notice in our paper in regards to Black River.

RCW 28A.335.020
School closures — Policy of citizen involvement required — Summary of effects — Hearings — Notice.

Before any school closure, a school district board of directors shall adopt a policy regarding school closures which provides for citizen involvement before the school district board of directors considers the closure of any school for instructional purposes. The policy adopted shall include provisions for the development of a written summary containing an analysis as to the effects of the proposed school closure. The policy shall also include a requirement that during the ninety days before a school district’s final decision upon any school closure, the school board of directors shall conduct hearings to receive testimony from the public on any issues related to the closure of any school for instructional purposes. The policy shall require separate hearings for each school which is proposed to be closed.
The policy adopted shall provide for reasonable notice to the residents affected by the proposed school closure. At a minimum, the notice of any hearing pertaining to a proposed school closure shall contain the date, time, place, and purpose of the hearing. Notice of each hearing shall be published once each week for two consecutive weeks in a newspaper of general circulation in the area where the school, subject to closure, is located. The last notice of hearing shall be published not later than seven days immediately before the final hearing.

The Renton School District will face $2.5 million in cuts from the Washington State Legislature.

Legislators finally agreed on a budget for next year, handing final numbers to school districts about a month late.

Up until now the district has been preparing for the worst, the governor’s initial budget which would have meant a $4.3 million.

To make time to review the better-than-expected numbers, the district is pushing back its three public budget meetings from next week to mid-May.

This will mean the district will have a clearer idea of what they plan to cut at the meetings. But parents will then have less time to respond, before the board approves the budget in August.

The cuts include the loss of all remaining I-728 funds with $1.3 million, and loss of about $940,000 for the K-4 student ratio money, meaning about 7 teacher positions.

The district will also lose money for a teacher training day, but it won’t have to increase contributions to state-mandated retirement funds, about $500,000 in savings.

The final budget gap is still unknown, as the district hasn’t made a complete decision on Honeydew Elementary School yet.

The meetings have been moved from April 20-22 to 7 p.m. May 10 at Lindbergh High School, May 13 at Hazen and May 17 at Renton.

The press release has more details about the cuts. Watch for my story on RentonReporter.com. I should have some comments from school administrators.

Press Release 2010 2011 Budget Communication 4-14-2010

District administrators have announced plans to close Black River High School next year, sending about 125 students, many with special needs, back into mainstream schools.

Black River is an alternative public school that hosts students who struggle in normal classroom settings.

Mother Wendy Bluhm reported that extra security, including the King County Sheriff’s Office, were called to the school, while teachers broke the news.

However, Renton School District spokesperson Randy Matheson later stated in an e-mail that extra security was not used.

“The students were really upset. They don’t know what to do,” she said. “I’m sure dropping out is going through their minds.”

The district has plans to tear down the Black River facility and to build a new Secondary Learning Center in its place, according to a press release.

A new alternative program will be designed during the facility’s construction. It’s scheduled to open in the 2012-2013 school year.

The decision to close the school came with little discussion, said Bluhm. Teachers didn’t hear about it until an early April staff meeting.

“This didn’t occur until the last minute,” Bluhm said. “It was never in the budget.”
Parents are planning to attend Wednesday’s board meeting at the Kohlwes Education Center, 7 p.m., April 14.

Below is a press release.
Dist to Build New BR Site-3!30!10 (2)

Hazen High School hosted Puget Sound Energy officials today to celebrate the installation of three new solar panels.

About 300 science students filled the auditorium to hear about the new project. Many will have the opportunity to start analyzing the panel’s data in the coming school year.

Generating enough energy to power the school’s outdoor LED lighting, the panels are meant for education, not actual energy production.

The Hazen project is the district’s second, which is unusual. A similar project at Dimmitt Middle School was installed in the Fall from a Seattle City Light grant. That project hasn’t been finished, because of discussion over how the panels should be grounded.

The $25,000 in grant money was given to the Bonneville Environmental Foundation, which organized the whole project, from installation to training educators.