Fewer Virginia schools met federal academic standards last school year despite more students passing state reading and math tests and a shrinking achievement gap between white and minority pupils, state education officials said Thursday.
Of the commonwealth’s 1,855 public schools, 1,321 — or 71 percent — made “adequate yearly progress,” a set of progressively tougher achievement benchmarks established under the No Child Left Behind Act. In the prior school year, 74 percent of Virginia schools met the standard.
Of the 525 schools that fell short last year, 198 were lacking in only one of the federal government’s objectives, according to the Virginia Department of Education. The status of nine schools is yet to be determined.
The Bush-era education law also imposes increasingly onerous sanctions for federally funded Title I schools — those with high numbers of low-income students — that fail to meet the annual benchmark. Officials said 103 Title I schools face sanctions that range from allowing students to transfer into higher-performing schools to broad restructuring.
“Student achievement — especially among minority students — increased overall and in critical areas such as early reading and middle school mathematics,” said Superintendent of Public Instruction Patricia Wright. “This continued progress reflects improvements in teaching and learning in formerly low-performing schools and a data-driven, student-by-student approach to raising achievement.”
The results were derived from Virginia’s “Standards of Learning” standardized tests.
