School Receives Exemplary Ratings
by Michelle Keszler
October 08, 2009
The 2008-2009 State of the Schools Report was released last week. The Report is also referred to as the Report Card on Nebraska Schools. The Report Card contains a wealth of information about our school district. You can find a profile describing student demographics, state accountability ratings, student performance data, and teacher demographics. You can also find information on attendance, graduation, finance, special education, and much much more.
The State Department of education assigns district ratings. District ratings show the quality of the district assessments used to measure student learning on standards and tell how well students performed on standards. Math and reading assessments at grades 3-6, 7-8, and 11 are rated as Exemplary. Student performance in reading is rated as Exemplary as all levels. Math performance was rated as Exemplary at all three levels as well.
Since we began reporting data to the Department of education in 2001, the percent of students meeting or exceeding the state standards has significantly increased at each grade level. Nearly 25% more fourth graders, 46% more eighth graders, and 38% more eleventh graders were proficient in 2009. Nearly all grade levels showed growth in math as well. Forty-seven percent of fourth graders, 41% more eighth graders, and 42% more eleventh graders were proficient. Writing scores are also consistently higher.
The table below illustrates the percent of students proficient at each grade level in each content area that is reported. Theses percentages are from 2008-2009.
| Grade 3 | Grade 4 | Grade 5 | Grade 6 | Grade 7 | Grade 8 | Grade 11 | |
| Reading | 95.35% | 87.5% | 94.44% | 97.56% | 83.33% | 97.06% | 90.91% |
| Writing | 94.62% | 96.67% | 100% | ||||
| Math | 93.18% | 95.24% | 89.19% | 100% | 85.71% | 97.06% | 88.24% |
| Science | 62.16% | 73.53% | 67.65% |
Federal accountability ratings, Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), is based upon student performance in reading and math in grades 3-8 and 11. Those ratings have also been released. All grade levels met AYP goals for 2008-2009.
Our district is above the state wide average for number of students on free/reduced lunches. Our percentage of English language learners, 9.45%, is also higher than the state average. Our graduation rate remains slightly higher than the state rate while our attendance rate has fallen below the state average rate.
Bridgeport Public Schools is staffed by highly qualified teachers. Nearly twenty percent of our teachers have Master’s Degrees. The average years of teaching experience is over 16 and over 97% of the high school teachers are teaching within their endorsed areas.
There is a wealth of other information available on the Report Card. Go to http://www.nde.state.ne.us/ for more detailed information. Call Michelle Keszler at 262-1470 if you have any questions.
