NEWS INFORMATION FROM

THE OFFICE OF MAYOR STEPHEN R. REED
City of Harrisburg
King City Government Center
Harrisburg, PA 17101-1678
Telephone: 717.255.3040

FOR IMMEDIATE USE
31 Aug 2006

ADDITIONAL TEST SCORE DATA RELEASED FOR SCHOOLS

Mayor Stephen R. Reed said today that additional data from the PSSA tests of last year have been released by the state Dept. of Education for schools across the state.

For Harrisburg, the newly released information indicates that:

o Test participation and attendance rates have increased across the board for all schools in the Harrisburg School District and have been deemed to meet or exceed state standards for individual schools except for the high school, in terms of attendance, and except for the high school and one middle school in terms of test participation;

o Seven of the city schools were recognized for making progress in math and five in reading; one school Ben Franklin, was evaluated as being above the standards in both categories; two schools were rated as not making progress in math and five in reading, which is why the districtwide emphasis on literacy remains critically important, Reed said, in order to further increase literacy proficiency; data was not yet available from the state on two city schools;

o Four of the city’s 13 schools were deemed to be making what is termed Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), up from only one school last year; they are the Hamilton, Steele, Camp Curtin and Scott Schools;

o The number of students scoring at or below basic has dropped 20%; the number of students scoring at proficient or advanced levels has more than slightly doubled

Reed said that achieving Adequate Yearly Progress is a moving target because each school has to improve each year and the targeted level of improvement is raised every time a school achieves AYP.

He said the test data indicates the district continues to make steady gains but that systemwide improvement remains a work in progress. Not every school and not every class is moving forward at the same rate, which is why newly upgraded curriculum, additional teacher and administrator training, and focused learning programs are geared to engendering further gains. City schools resume classes for the new school year next Tuesday. Teacher and administrator orientations have been underway for the past 10 days.

Dr. Gerald Kohn, District Superintendent, said that taxpayers and parents can see bright spots in the continuing improvement efforts and that the school administration is focused on the soft spots where additional corrective actions are needed.