The Illinois State Board of Education last week published the annual Illinois Report Card, with Monroe County’s school districts showing generally strong performance while stumbling in some areas seemingly due in part to how the assessments are put together.

The report card serves as a compilation of data on a range of education concerns. Focusing on academics but also touching on learning environment, faculty details and other matters, the report offers an overview of how schools and districts in Illinois performed throughout last year.

One metric through which schools in the state are evaluated is their summative designation. ISBE uses these designations as a measure of progress in both academic performance and student success.

Schools are designated as exemplary if they are in the top 10 percent of schools statewide with no underperforming student groups.

A commendable designation is achieved if a school has no underperforming student groups, a graduation rate of at least 67 percent and performance below the top 10 percent of schools statewide.

Targeted designations indicate schools with one or more student groups that performed at or below the level of students in the lowest performing five percent of schools, and comprehensive and intensive designations indicate schools that are among the states lowest performers or high schools with graduation rates below 67 percent.

At the state level, 376 schools earned an exemplary designation, 2,751 were commendable, 435 were targeted, 123 were comprehensive and 66 were intensive.

Regarding academic performance, schools are evaluated on a number of areas including English Language Arts proficiency and growth, with similar measurements for math.

Proficiency is measured primarily via performance on the ACT for high school students and the Illinois Assessment of Readiness for students in grades 3-8.

At the state level, 51.7 percent of students met ELA proficiency criteria through the ACT with 53.1 proficient through the IAR.

In math, 39.3 percent of students were labeled as proficient through the ACT, 38.5 through the IAR.

Growth in ELA and math is a measure of student development which compares the student’s performance over time to their peers. Student growth percentiles range from 1 to 99, with a score of 50 representing the state average or expected growth.

Graduation rates throughout Illinois averaged at 89 percent while chronic absenteeism stood at 25.4 percent. Chronic absenteeism is noted as missing 10 percent or more of school days per year.

Regarding educators, the state showed an 89.5 percent retention rate while 96.9 percent of teachers were evaluated as excellent or proficient by an administrator or other evaluator.

Zooming in to Monroe County, local performance last year was generally strong as usual, though Waterloo in particular encountered some trouble with its summative designations.

While all schools in the district are usually marked as commendable or exemplary, the latest report card marked Waterloo High School as exemplary, Waterloo Junior High School and Gardner Elementary as commendable and Rogers Elementary and W.J. Zahnow Elementary as targeted.

Waterloo Superintendent of Schools Brian Charron spoke about these designations, noting that the amount of growth measured among students is a key factor which goes into the designation.

This affected the district’s designations for two particular reasons. As Charron explained, no testing takes place at Zahnow, with 3rd graders tested at Rogers and growth measured among 4th graders at Gardner. The growth factor, then, impacted Rogers and Zahnow collectively.

Additionally, Charron noted that a subgroup of students with disabilities in the 4th grade happened to underperform in their growth scores.

“We don’t think it’s fair to label Zahnow and Rogers as targeted, and even the state has questioned that this doesn’t sound right, but this is how their ratings go,” Charron said. “If your elementary building does not have a growth rating, it goes to the first grade level that does, and that is your growth rating. And it’s not overall students. We had over 70 percent that were proficient.”

Waterloo grades 6-12 curriculum coordinator John Schmieg also said that a number of schools in the region might similarly have groups of students that underperformed, though this impacted Waterloo in particular as their subgroup in question consists of 20 or more students and can thus have a substantial effect on their summative designations.

Looking at ELA growth and proficiency, 65.9 percent of Waterloo high schoolers were labeled as proficient through the ACT, 73 percent through the IAR. High school growth was measured at 42.6 with IAR growth at 44.3.

In math, 56.5 percent of students achieved ACT proficiency alongside 57.4 percent with the IAR. High school growth in math fell at 46.9 with 36.9 via the IAR.

Speaking about ongoing progress with the district’s curriculum, Charron commented on how these scores from last year affect the district’s goals and direction.

“These scores have certainly caused us to want to take another look at how all of our kids are doing but also our subgroups of kids and determine whether or not we should be applying more resources,” Charron said. “We want to do a deeper dive into math curriculum, math instruction and find if there are any deficits that we have, or maybe this is just an anomaly that 4th grade didn’t do well at this time.”

Schmieg also spoke on the district’s ELA and math measurements.

“Our proficiency, the number of students that are proficient in the standards, is up again,” Schmieg said. “It’s the growth part that is challenging for us.”

Beyond academics, Waterloo achieved a graduation rate of 93.1 percent and a chronic absenteeism rate of 11.5 percent.

Among educators, Waterloo had a teacher retention rate of 91.4 percent and 100 percent of teachers rated as proficient or excellent.

While the district shows a teacher retention rate slightly higher than the state average, this has still been an area of concern in recent years given pension concerns throughout Illinois. Those concerns are particularly felt in Monroe County given the proximity to Missouri.

Charron offered his thoughts on the matter, voicing his appreciation of the district’s work with the teachers union and their concern for both new and long-time educators.

“It has been a concern for us,” Charron said. “We’ve had more turnover here than we would like, but I do think that the board has very cooperatively worked with our union in the two previous teacher negotiations. And I’m actually very appreciative of our teachers union as well. It is not typical for a union to come in and want to see salaries increase for beginning teachers.”

In Columbia, the district showed particularly strong performance with Columbia High School, Eagleview Elementary and Parkview Elementary all designated as exemplary. Columbia Middle School was labeled as commendable.

Columbia Superintendent of Schools Chris Grode voiced his pride at these designations and the performance of the district’s students and staff.

“We do very well every year,” Grode said. “I’m glad to see that we’ve continued that track.”

Concerning ELA growth and proficiency, ACT performance had 66.7 percent of Columbia students marked as proficient along with 81.5 percent proficient through the IAR. ELA growth stood at 49.7 for high school students and 58.3 for younger students.

In math, 64.5 percent of students were proficient through the ACT with 70.6 percent through the IAR. Growth here came in at 52.4 at the high school level and 54.2 via the IAR.

Columbia Assistant Superintendent of Schools Amanda Ganey spoke positively about the districts curriculum achievements and developments over the past year – including a new social studies curriculum for grades 3-12 and new ELA curriculum for K-8.

As she’s done at many monthly school board meetings, she placed emphasis on the importance of providing consistency in the curriculum throughout the district.

“It’s not about the curriculum, but it’s about giving that core resource a backbone that is consistent and aligned vertically throughout all grade levels in the district,” Ganey said. “I definitely think that that will continue to support our ELA scores.”

On other student concerns, Columbia had a graduation rate of 97.6 percent and a chronic absenteeism rate of 5.7 percent.

Regarding teachers, the retention rate in the city landed at 90.9 percent with 100 percent evaluated as proficient or excellent.

Grode remarked on the district’s retention rate.

“We’ve always been very, very happy with our hires as well as our retention of those people,” Grode said. “Really, a lot of the people that have left us have left us because of family reasons… I think Columbia is an excellent place to work, an excellent place to have your kids go to school.”

Ganey spoke further on the district’s performance and the ability of its educators.

“We have excellent educators doing exactly what they need to do for the students in Columbia which is proven in our school report card designations,” Ganey said. “As leaders in the district, our job is to continue to support the needs of our teachers and our students.”

In Valmeyer, the village’s school district earned commendable designations for its elementary school, junior high and high school.

On ELA performance, ACT results found 63.2 of students were proficient with the IAR demonstrating 40.6 percent of students as proficient. ELA growth stood at 47.3 in the high school and 43.2 for younger students.

In math, 52.6 percent of high school students were labeled proficient. This figure is significantly lower among younger students at 24.5 percent. For math growth, this figure is 49.9 for the high school and 42.4 for IAR students.

The district had a graduation rate of 90.9 percent and a chronic absenteeism rate of 16.1 percent.

Teacher retention in Valmeyer held at 92.2 percent with all educators evaluated as proficient or excellent.