BY KARISSA MILLER

Iredell-Statesville Schools Superintendent Jeff James continues to push for changes to North Carolina’s accountability model, which he argues negatively impacts public education.

As part of his annual end-of-year review on Wednesday, James renewed his call for changes to the grading system that the state uses to evaluate public schools.

“The model is not representative of the teaching and learning that takes place in our schools,” he said. 

Starting in 2013, all North Carolina public schools began receiving A-F performance grades as a component of annual report cards for each school and district.

The letter grade is determined by two components:
• 80-percent of the grade is determined by student achievement or results on end-of-year and end-of-course tests
• 20-percent of the weight of the grade is determined by student growth as measured by SAS Education Value-Added Assessment System (EVAAS).

Each school’s overall grade is calculated on a 15-point scale:
• A: 85-100
• B: 70-84
• C: 55-69
• D: 40-54
• F: 39 or less.

Supporters of the school performance grade believe students benefit from being held accountable and that grades can encourage more targeted school improvement.

Critics of school performance grades believe that grades do not reflect the learning that goes on each year. Furthermore, low grades stigmatize schools that receive low grades and serve to label schools based on family income of the students and do not provide support to help struggling schools improve.

Low-performing schools

The N.C. General Assembly defines a “low performing school” to include any school that receives a school performance grade of D or F, whether the school has “met growth” or has “not met growth” for the year.

According to I-SS Chief Student Service Officer Shayla Savage, this means a school could be labeled as “low-performing” even when its students are achieving expected levels of year-to-year growth.

As a result, the grading system continues to increase parent and public misconceptions that very little achievement or learning is taking place in the school, she added.

Thirteen I-SS schools are currently considered low performing , with nine of them classified as D schools and four of them as F schools.

Four I-SS schools have been classified as low performing for nearly a decade. This list includes NB Mills Elementary and Third Creek Middle (since 2014), Statesville High (since 2015) and Cloverleaf Elementary (since 2016).

Superintendent James points out that statistically value-added models are used in agriculture. He said that using EVAAS data points aren’t the best representation for student growth because it uses a bell curve to determine progress, exceed growth or not meet growth.

He mentioned that only five states currently use EVAAS data: North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

“The current model is based on the bell curve. When you enter into a bell curve, you enter into a system where there are winners and losers. You don’t have a system built on true understanding of content, but that only so many can pass and fail each year. We can’t have 100 percent. Students will never perform at a 100 percent pass rate based on bell curve system,” Cloverleaf Elementary School Principal Andy Mehall said.

Even though Cloverleaf grew 10 proficiency points, the school is still considered low performing, Mehall said.

Schools need accountability, Mehall said, but he supports James’ idea of using a true pre-test and post-test to gauge student progress.

James said he wants lawmakers to revamp how schools are evaluated to ensure a fair comparison of grades from year to year.

A call for increased support

The principals at the district’s high-poverty/low-performing schools addressed the school board on March 13, 2023.

They explained the impact of North Carolina’s school performance grades, explaining that they skew the perception of their schools in a negative direction with parents and the community. The grades also hinder efforts to recruit certified teachers, the principals said.

During that meeting, the principals and teachers were asked how the school board could better support their schools. They detailed several ways, including mentoring their students, helping with teacher retention and growing community support at their school, to name a few.

During Monday’s board meeting, I-SS Chief Elementary Academic Officer Jonathan Ribbeck thanked board members Abby Trent, Brian Sloan and Mike Kubiniec for volunteering at NB Mills and East Elementary last month.

Trent, the board’s vice chair, also began a reading program at NB Mills Elementary and has made efforts to boost morale throughout the year for the teachers and staff at some of the district’s low-performing schools.

District and board members have different views of the problems

While I-SS administrators want the state to revamp the grading system, some board members have other ideas.

Kubiniec said he believes the problem is that the district is not meeting the challenges.

“I’m looking at all this data, and the results are not good,” Kubiniec said.

“We’ve got problems to solve. I’m just stunned at what I’m seeing. I’m stunned at a couple of other school districts that are turning things around and I wonder why we aren’t doing that,” he added.

Board member Anita Kurn suggested modeling I-SS after another county that achieved some success using “word wall,” or a display of important words to build a child’s vocabulary. She also asked about principal accountability at the low-performing schools.

In response to those comments, administrators explained that district principals are held accountable in regular performance reviews.

One teacher, who didn’t want to be identified for fear of retaliation, at one the district’s low performing schools criticized the school board for failing to advocate for the schools and students in the district.

“I want them to do better,” the teacher said.

High-poverty schools are stigmatized

I-SS Chief Secondary Academic Officer Kelly Cooper said that the district looks at data frequently for all of its schools.

The district uses a program called iReady, which evaluates students when they start school, mid-year and at the end of the school year.

Third Creek Middle School’s math, she explained, is an example of the growth that is taking place.

“We had 75 percent of the kids who were significantly below on math, meaning two or three grade levels behind, for their beginning of the year diagnostic,” she said. “Yesterday, we had 62 percent who were significantly below, which is a change of 13 percent.”

Cooper explained that this is an example of one of the district’s high-poverty schools where students come in significantly behind grade level.

Although those students are demonstrating growth and moving forward, which is huge and something that the district celebrated, Cooper said, they aren’t getting as much credit for their learning because the school likely won’t meet the proficiency benchmark on their end-of-grade tests.