Carroll County students bucked the state and national trend and improved their SAT scores with Winters Mill High School leading the way, according to reports released this week.
Winters Mill?s numbers improved 119 points, to 1582. In comparison, the county improved an average of 10 points, to 1545.
“The Winters Mill achievement is a pretty rare feat,” said Gregg Bricca, director of Carroll?s schools research and accountability.
Winters Mill?s increased 39 points soon the verbal section of the test, 43 points in math and 37 points in writing.
“That?s a huge gain in one year,” Winters Mill Principal Ken Goncz
said. “We had a good feeling the scores would go up, but we?re very pleased.”
He couldn?t attribute his school?s surprising success to any one program.
The school?s AP Potential program studies students? Practice SAT scores to determine if they?re prepared to take the SATs and Advanced Placement courses, and guidance counselors motivate studentsby comparing their scores to average entrance scores for popular colleges. Counselors also meet with students starting in the ninth grade to promote taking the PSATs.
“It?s been a combination of things that have phased in over the last few years,” Goncz said.
The state?s scores, however, plummeted 13 points, and its math scores slid seven.
“The SAT really measures the strength of our program as a whole,” Bricca said.
Meanwhile, High School Assessment scores were also released this week, but are not comparable, because different courses can be taken at varying grade levels.
For instance, only about 45 percent of 10th-graders in Carroll took the HSA biology test, because biology is not a standard course in the county until students? junior year.
The state required juniors to pass all HSA tests in English, government, algebra and biology to graduate in 2009.
