Many schools cash in, not all

10/16/01
By JOSHUA MOLINA
NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER

Education: Some campuses on South Coast qualify

More than 40 public schools in Santa Barbara County will be eligible for cherished cash awards, but 30 schools will miss out on the bonuses, according to state rankings of standardized test results released on Monday.

None of the four high schools on the South Coast qualifies for the state money. Either the schools didn't increase standardized tests scores enough or scored worse than the year before, according to the results.

Most South Coast elementary schools, however, continued to improve and many will be eligible for a share of the $157 million available from the Governor's Performance Award for high-achieving schools throughout California.

"I think all of our schools are headed in the right direction," said Debbie Flores, superintendent of Santa Barbara schools. "It gets harder and harder every year to make progress. The hard work of all of our staff and students is paying off and I am very proud of that."

If schools meet their targets, they can receive $63 per student, according to state Department of Education. The money can be spent on an array of improvements or services decided by a school-wide council, but must ultimately be approved by the school board.

Across the state, 74 percent of schools increased their Academic Performance Index (API) rankings and 57 percent met their target goals for improvement. Another 48 percent are eligible for the cash awards.

Results from the 2000 and 2001 Stanford Achievement Test (SAT-9) were used to calculate a school's API. The state Department of Education ranks schools throughout the state a number between 200 and 1,000. A ranking above 800 is considered the goal for schools.

While some schools may have scored high as a whole, they may not have qualified for cash awards because they didn't improve scores enough among subgroups such as Latinos and children from low-income families.

In the Santa Barbara Elementary School District, only Harding and Roosevelt did not improve scores enough to be eligible for cash rewards. Harding's test scores decreased slightly from 2000 to 2001, after strong gains in previous years.

"I am not surprised," Ms. Flores said. "They had made the most growth of any elementary school in our county. It's very hard for a school to continue that kind of progress. This year was about flat and we will be looking at why that is the case."

Ms. Flores said she was thrilled that La Cumbre Middle School improved its scores enough to be eligible for the cash awards. Last year, the school failed to make the cut.

Educational reforms at that school are really working, Ms. Flores said.

"We hope to see this kind of growth at La Cumbre three or four years in a row," Ms. Flores said. "It shows the major effort on the part of the staff and the principal."

While Dos Pueblos and San Marcos High School improved scores from last year, it wasn't by a large enough margin to be eligible for cash awards, she said.

Santa Barbara High School's ranking, however, dropped by 10 points.

That was surprising, Ms. Flores said.

"We don't have an explanation," she said. "Obviously we will want to put our heads together and see what happened."

In Goleta, Brandon, El Camino and La Patera elementary schools showed strong gains in their API ranking. Some schools continue to score high on test scores and rankings, but aren't improving rapidly enough to be eligible for awards.

El Rancho, Kellogg and Mountain View schools, for example, all average well above 800 in their API ranking, but will still miss out on cash awards because their rankings all dipped slightly.

"We are very happy that we continue to have four schools that are above 800," said Daniel Cooperman, assistant superintendent of Instruction Affairs for the Goleta Union School District.

Mr. Cooperman said, however, that they will continue to work on Isla Vista Elementary, which dropped by 20 points in its ranking from 2000 to 2001. He said that educational reform efforts are continuing for students who are learning English and who come from low-income families.

In other parts of the county, Arellanes School in the Santa Maria-Bonita Elementary School District had the biggest gain of any school in the county. It improved its ranking by 89 points. Last year, Arellanes missed out on cash awards. All but one of 11 schools in the district will be eligible for cash awards.

All three elementary schools in the Carpinteria Unified School District met their targets and will qualify for the bonuses. In Lompoc most schools increased test scores and about half will be eligible for bonuses.