School trustees review graduation rates, test scores

The Natrona County School District has embarked on a five-year plan to improve graduation rates, reading skills, school-level performance, and student, parent and staff satisfaction.

The district's trustees will talk about the progress toward those goals during the 6 p.m. Monday work session before its bimonthly meeting at the Central Service Building at 970 N. Glenn Road.

By 2019, the district wants 85 percent of its students to graduate and be ready for college or high-skills careers.

However, the graduations rates have hovered in the low- to mid-70 percent for the past decade, according to the report prepared for the meeting. Graduation rates for districts statewide have consistently been higher than those of the NCSD, and exceeded the 80 percent range from 2008-2010.

ACT (American College Testing) score performance is another key indicator of student performers, according to the report. The ACT is given to juniors and used for Wyoming State Accountability school performance levels.

Students in the district continue to perform at or slightly below the state average scores, with smaller high schools about four points less than that.

"Our district high school students performed significantly below the state’s percent proficient levels in math, reading and science in 2013-2014," according to the report. "District wide, math continues to be a focus area with only 29% of our students meeting proficiency as compared to the state average of 39%. In addition to trailing state proficiency levels, only 15% of our students are meeting the College and Career Benchmarks standards in all four content areas (math, reading, science, and English)."

The report also discusses how the schools in the district are meeting accountability levels.

In the district, 31 percent schools met the goal, 58 percent did not, and 11 percent are unclassified because they are rural schools, according to the report. "It is notable, that NCSD has a higher percentage of schools in the partial and not meeting expectation categories than the statewide percentages."

At the regular meeting at 7:30 p.m., trustees are scheduled to approve contracts with the Laramie-based Cathedral Home for Learning for special education services; with Catapult Learning for professional development for teachers at the Midwest schools; with Google Apps for training educators in technology; and with "Wonder, By Design" for the development of academy learning.

The trustees are scheduled to approve an agreement between the district and the Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Wyoming Endowment Foundation to foster financial literacy.

The trustees also will hear a report about the progress of the construction projects throughout the district.