Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
LARWILL - Due to an error on the state's part, Whitko Middle School was placed on the list of schools identified for school improvement earlier this year.
After further study, the Indiana Department of Education Division of Compensatory Education revised the school's status for the 2002-03 school year. In a press release, the IDOE states the middle school is no longer on the list of schools identified for school improvement.
A Title I school is in school improvement when it has two consecutive years of not demonstrating adequate yearly progress.
ISTEP+ test scores for grades 6 and 8 at the middle school for the 1998-99 school year were lost and resulted in no scores, making the school's baseline year for school improvement 1999-00, not 1998-99. Based on this change in the baseline year, the school was removed from the list.
While in 2000-01, the school did not demonstrate adequate yearly progress, according to the IDOE, the school did improve by the 2001-02 school year.
"Basically," said Whitko Community School Corp. Director of Curriculum Diana Showalter, "the Title I office used incorrect ISTEP data."
She said when the IDOE used 1998-99 as the baseline year, it appeared to the computer the school did not make progress on its ISTEP scores. When the baseline year was changed, it showed the middle school had improved over a two-year period.
"We're doing well. We think we're on the right track," Showalter said. Students are improving and the eighth graders did exceptionally well this year on the testing. She said while the school corporation wants to see continuing improvement, they are not dissatisfied with the progress the students are making.
Had the correction not been made, ultimately students in school improvement schools could select to go to another school in the school district. Since there is only one middle school in the Whitko School Corp., "that was not an option," Showalter said.
Instead, the school corporation would have received intense assistance from the state on improving the school's testing. If no improvement was made over several years, the school's Title I funding may have been eliminated.
Showalter said the most damaging part of the error is "that failure tag," which gives the middle school a bad name. However, she said the school is meeting adequate yearly progress and the school corporation is providing students with the right tools to succeed.
