MHS' accountability rating to drop from academically acceptable to unacceptable from now until October

MISD to appeal MHS, district's accountability rating with state officials

District accountability rating may be upgraded to recognized if appeal is approved

By Brandi Hart
McKinneyUpdate.com editor
Published at 10: 15 p.m. on July 30, 2009

McKinney High School's accountability will be listed as unacceptable when the Texas Education Agency releases the 2009 campus accountability rating on July 31, but that may only be for a couple of months as McKinney ISD is appealing the rating.

However, the school's rating is expected to improve to an academically acceptable status in October, if the TEA approves McKinney ISD's appeal of MHS' unacceptable accountability rating, said Wade Johnson, MISD School Board member on July 30.

MISD is also appealing the district's overall accountability rating of academically acceptable, which will also be released by the TEA on July 31, Johnson said. If the district's appeal for the district wide accountability rating is approved, then the district's overall accountability rating is expected to improve to the e second highest accountability rating of recognized.

The ratings assigned to Texas schools and districts include exemplary, recognized, acceptable, and unacceptable, with exemplary being the highest level of achievement.  The ratings are based upon a variety of indicators, including:  Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) performance, dropout rate, completion rate and other factors.   

MHS was downgraded from an academically acceptable campus to an unacceptable campus due to the school staff members incorrectly coding the completion rate for Hispanic and economically disadvantaged students at MHS, according to a release issued late Thursday night, July 30 about the ratings. The campus staff incorrectly coded six students in regards to them completing the school year, which pushed MHS below the academically acceptable standard for its completion rate, said MISD Spokesperson Justin Acker. MISD is currently accounting for the students in preparation for an appeal to the TEA. 

“In reviewing the data, we have identified students in both the Hispanic and economically disadvantaged populations to remove the designation, but we must now appeal the rating to the Texas Education Agency and then await a final ruling,” said Tom Crowe, Superintendent of MISD. 

Johnson said that the whereabouts of the students have been found, after MISD had to submit the information by a certain deadline to the TEA, and he expects the appeal to be approved now that the students are accounted for. He also believes that MISD's overall accountability rating will be upgraded from the current academically acceptable rating to a recognized rating. MISD was rated an academically acceptable district in 2008 and in 2007 it was rated a recognized district.

"Had it not been for the MHS rating, then MISD would have an accountability rating of recognized," Johnson said.

McKinney Boyd High School will be receive a recognized rating and McKinney North HS will receive an academically acceptable rating on July 31. McKinney North HS was only three students shy of meeting the criteria to earn a recognized rating.

A high school campus is rated on 25 different indicators. Of these 25 indicators, 20 are related to academics. MHS' rating improved its performance on 15 of the 20 academic indicators, Acker said.  The improvement in the academic performance left the school only 30 students short of being a recognized high school, Acker added.

MHS Principal Stewart Herrington stated in an e-mail sent to parents on July 30 that when school dismissed on June 2, MHS staff members were very excited about academic gains that occurred during the 2008-2009 school year as measured by the spring TAKS test.

"We marked gains in almost all indicators. New this year, students who may not have passed the test, but showed growth towards passing by the 11nth grade were also credited to our percentages. When these numbers were added to the equation, MHS was on the doorstep of earning a recognized rating, a rare accomplishment at the high school level," Herrington stated.

However, his excitement turned when he received a report this summer of MHS's completion rate measures. The completion rate measure evaluates the graduating cohort of students from the previous school year (2007-2008) and is a new part of the annual rating for high schools, Herrington stated.

MHS' completion percentage in two of the five student groups fell just short of the standard of 75 percent required for the acceptable rating. In the Texas accountability system, falling below the standard in any measured indicator results in the lower rating being assigned to the campus.

Herrington determined that this low percentage for the class of 2008 cohort group resulted from coding errors associated with students who withdrew from MHS between September 2004, and June 2008, he said.

"With the help of many individuals, we spent many hours this summer attempting to track down students who had withdrawn from MHS as many as four or five years ago. We were able to locate a number of these students and determine what they did after leaving MHS. We determined that coding for some of these students should have been adjusted to reflect their actual educational status. We were able to recover a number of students in the cohort, enough in fact to exceed the 75 percent standard," Herrington stated.

He is currently working with district personnel to design a system that will provide more effective monitoring of the completion rate status at MHS, he said.

Crowe said that the teachers and administrators of MHS have worked very hard to maintain high academic standards and have seen the fruits of their labors through the improved academic performance campus wide.

"It is a real shame that one single indicator has caused this rating. It’s important to consider the context of the indicator, in comparison to the overall performance of the school.  As a district and campus we bear the responsibility for improving the process of coding students properly when they transfer out of the district, move out of state, pursue a GED, or begin home-schooling.  But it is imperative that when judging the quality of education at a school the other factors are considered.  In this case, they are close to achieving recognized status, but will be labeled unacceptable until we have the opportunity to appeal the designation," Crowe said.

A meeting has been scheduled for the public who have questions about MHS' current accountability rating, the appeal process and how the rating system works at 6:30 p.m. on Thurs., Aug. 6 in the MHS library on Wilson Creek Parkway, north of Towne Lake.

Middle schools to receive mostly positive rankings

Since the inception of the rating system, MISD elementary schools have performed exceptionally well with the vast majority receiving one of the top two ratings, said MISD Spokesperson Justin Acker.

Middle schools in the district also performed extremely well and four were ranked at the recognized level, Acker said. The accountability ratings for Evans Middle School, Cockrill Middle School, Dowell Middle School, and Scott Johnson Middle School will all be elevated to recognized status. 

Each campus' ratings will be published at 1 p.m. on July 31 on the TEA's Web site www.tea.tx.us , which will include all Texas public school districts' and campuses' accountability ratings as well.

MISD individual campus 2009 TEA accountability ratings -

Elementary schools - 2007-2008 ratings, 2008-2009 ratings

Bennett Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Burks Elementary - Academically acceptable, Academically acceptable

Caldwell Elementary - Recognized, Recognized

CT Eddins Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Finch Elementary - Academically acceptable, academically acceptable

Glen Oaks Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Minshew Elementary - Recognized, Exemplary

McNeil Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

McGowen Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Naomi Press Elementary - Academically acceptable, Recognized

Slaughter Elementary - Recognized, Exemplary

Reuben Johnson Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Valley Creek Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Vega Elementary - Recognized, Recognized

Roy Lee Walker Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Webb Elementary - Recognized, Recognized

Wilmeth Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Wolford Elementary - Exemplary, Exemplary

Middle schools -

Cockrill MS - Recognized, did not have a 2007-2008 rating as the school opened during the 2008-2009 school year

Dowell MS - Academically acceptable, Recognized

Evans MS - Academically acceptable, Recognized

Faubion MS - Academically acceptable, Academically acceptable

Scott Johnson MS -Academically acceptable, Recognized

High schools -

McKinney High School - Academically acceptable, Academically unacceptable

McKinney North HS - Academcally acceptable, Academically acceptable

McKinney Boyd HS - Academically acceptable, Recognized

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