Student achievement was a primary focus of Wednesday night's Fulton School Board meeting.
The night started off with recognition of 11 high school students who earned perfect scores on their End of Course exams at the end of last year.
The bulk of the rest of the meeting consisted of Assistant Superintendent Suzanne Hull's presentation on the district's MAP results and MSIP 5 Annual Performance Report.
The Fulton Sun will run a detailed story on district MAP results based on that report in the Sunday edition, but Hull did identify several areas of concern Wednesday night, particularly third- and sixth-grade communication arts and Algebra I at the high school.
The district trailed the state in percentage of students achieving at the advanced, proficient and basic levels in both of those grade levels and subjects.
Hull said she contacted the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education as soon as she saw the communication arts scores. She said the state as a whole experienced a drop in third- and fourth-grade communication arts that was big enough to prompt an investigation as to a potential cause.
"They believe it was the level of rigor - the test changed slightly," Hull said.
Hull also made special note of the district's science scores, noting they "need some work."
She attributed that in part to changes in curriculum in fifth grade and at the middle school - Hull said it is not uncommon to see a dip in the first year of implementing new resources.
The district's ACT composite score also dropped, going from 22.5 in 2012-13 to 20.9 for 2013-14, but Hull said that was not unexpected.
"The year before we had a high-performing class," Hull said, adding that, "I expect it to rebound this year."
On a more positive note, Hull pointed out that the high school was at 100 percent for graduation under the MSIP 5 standards for the first time since she has been with the district.
"Every teacher at this high school knows what every kid is doing every day," she said.
Middle school plan
The school board heard from Middle School Principal Chris Crane as well. With the middle school performing lower than the rest of the district in the MSIP 5 standards - earning a total score of only 55 percent - Crane spoke about the improvement plan he and his staff have started working on for their building.
"We're a little embarrassed," Crane said of the middle school's reaction to its performance score. "That's a real punch in the gut."
He gave the board a three-year comparison of the middle school's MAP performance:
•In English/language arts, 51.8 percent of students scored proficient or advanced in 2012, 48.9 percent in 2013 and 45.2 percent in 2014.
•In math, 57.3 percent of students scored proficient or advanced in 2012, 47.9 percent in 2013 and 54 percent in 2014.
•In science, 53.7 percent of students scored proficient or advanced in 2012, 50.6 percent in 2013 and 47.3 percent in 2014.
"Obviously we have a long ways to go (but) our common theme is, "We can do this, and we will do this,'" Crane said.
He said the middle school is renewing and intensifying its focus on data this year and will be repeating year two of PLC (Positive Learning Communities), which focuses on data teams.
"Data must drive everything we do," Crane said. "What are the numbers and what are they telling us?"
He said the primary question middle school staff members are asking themselves this year is what can they do differently.
"We cannot continue to do the same things and expect different results," Crane said.
Changes for the middle school this year include:
•Scheduling: Crane said 90-95 percent of building teachers doing English/language arts have an hour-and-a-half with the same students each day.
•Teams: Teaching teams will be based on grade level so the same teachers will be dealing with a common group of students, enabling them to compare notes and share strategies that are effective with particular students.
•The Catch Up Café will now change focus to more-individualized tutoring.
•Institution of structured intervention time.
•Continuation of the literacy initiative started last year.
A building improvement team consisting of the school's literacy and instruction consultants, advisers from DESE, district administration and middle school staff has already started meeting regularly to develop 30- 60- and 90-day plans
Crane said all middle school teachers did pre-testing in their subject areas within the first three days of school, and many have started doing post testing and have seen marked improvement.
"I can assure you these men and women have been working their tails off," Crane said.