Wissahickon School District Achieves Adequate Yearly Progress

"We continue to see high achievement from our students," said Jennifer Schmidt, of Wissahickon's Curriculum and Learning Office, when she began discussing the PSSA results from 2011-12 school year.

The biggest improvement was in grade 11's writing assessment, which went from 97 percent proficient in 2011 to 99 percent of the class proficient during the 2012 test.

To qualify for Adequate Yearly Progress, the standards that school districts are held to, Wissahickon needed to meet four goals: Attendance rates of 90 percent or higher, graduation rates of 85 percent of higher, a 95 percent PSSA participation for the reading and math tests, and PSSA Performance.

For PSSA Performance, at least 81 percent of students must score proficient or advanced in reading and at least 78 percent must score proficient or advanced in Mathematics.

Wissahickon School District overall did make AYP. 

Schmidt said the Curriculum and Learning Office is continuing to work with schools to put specific measures in place for the specific subgroups that consistently do not make AYP.

During this school year, there will be changes coming to the state standardized testing. There will no longer be an 11th grade PSSA and instead, students will take the new Keystone Exams in Algebra 1, Literature and Biology. These tests will also be available in an online format.

However, the 12th grade PSSA retest will continue to be offered this year for seniors that did not make proficient during their 11th grade testing.

There will also continue to be a math and reading PSSA test for grades 3 through 8, a science PSSA for grades 4 and 8, and a writing PSSA for grades 5 and 8.

For the new Keystone Exams, the proposed state requirement is that the class of 2017 (the current 8th grade) will demonstrate proficiency for graduation.

The Keystone Exams will be taken at the conclusion of the related course. All 11th grade students will be required to take all three Keystone Exams, and non-11th grade students taking the exams will have their results held until their junior year. However, if the students do not score advance or proficient, they will retake the test during their 11th grade year.