An analysis of data included in the School District of Mystery Lake’s (SDML) most recent community report for the 2015-16 school year, which was released Oct. 26, and the reports from the previous three school years, shows that graduation and attendance rates have remained fairly steady over the past four years. However, it also shows that fewer than 40 per cent of Grade 8 students met expectations in writing and reading comprehension core competencies last year.
The graduation rate for the 2015-16 school year was 54.5 per cent, down slightly from 54.6 in the 2014-15 school year and a bit higher than the 54.1 per cent in 2012-13. The 2013-14 rate of 55.9 per cent was the highest for SDML in the past nine years.
Attendance has also held steady at 88.59, 88 and 88.18 per cent for the school year over the last three years. It was 90.72 per cent in the 2012-13 school year. September and October have been the only months with a district-wide average attendance rate above 90 per cent in the last two school years. In 2013-14 attendance was also above 90 per cent in November while in 2012-13 it was above 90 per cent in September, October, November, January and February.
The picture is a little dimmer when it comes to the percentage of students meeting expectations for core competencies at the Grade 3, Grade 7 and Grade 8 levels.
The highest percentage of Grade 3 students meeting mental math expectations over the previous four school years was 46.19 per cent in 2014-15. The best percentage for meeting expectations in the expression of equality was 54.3 per cent in 2012-13 and less than half have done so in the past three years, with a low of 39.2 per cent in 2014-15. The number of Grade 3 students recognizing and forming patterns up to expectations was 44.4 per cent in 2015-16, higher than the previous three years. In 2014-15 only 38.3 per cent were doing so and in 2013-14 the percentage was 34. More than half of Grade 3 students met expectations for representing numbers in 2012-13, 2013-14 and 2014-15, with a high of 57.8 per cent in 2013-14 but last year the percentage dropped to 43.7. The percentage meeting expectations for reading reflection last year was 53 per cent, the first time it exceeded half since 2012-13 when it was 55.2 per cent. Just under half – 49.5 per cent – of Grade 3 students were meeting expectations in the area of literacy skills and strategies in 2015-16 while it was above 50 per cent in the previous three years, with a high of 53.5 per cent in the 2013-14 school year. Less than half of Grade 3 students were meeting comprehension expectations in the last four years, with 2014-15 having the highest percentage, at 49.7 per cent.
At the Grade 7 level, the percentage meeting grade expectations last year was the highest that it has been in the last four years in seven of 10 categories. Fifty-seven per cent were showing appropriate interest in learning last year, and 48.7 per cent were meeting self-assessment expectations. The percentage displaying appropriate awareness of learning goals was 54.1, while 50.7 per cent were meeting participation expectations, and 53.7 per cent were meeting expectations regarding responsibility for work. Nearly 60 per cent – 59.4 – were representing numbers according to expectations and 50.7 per cent were meeting expectations for problem-solving. The only categories in which last year’s Grade 7 students didn’t outdo those from the 2012-13 through 2014-15 school years were fraction, decimals and mental math. More than half – 56 per cent – met expectations regarding decimals in the 2015-16 school year, while 44.9 per cent met expectations for understanding fractions and 44 per cent met expectations in the area of mental math.
Fewer than 40 per cent of Grade 8 students in 2015-16 met expectations in six comprehension and writing competency categories. In writing conventions, 30.5 per cent met expectations last year, lower than the 38.8 per cent in 2013-14 and the 32.5 per cent in 2013-14. The percentage meeting language choice expectations last year was 32.3 per cent, the highest percentage since it was 34.7 per cent in 2012-13. Just over a third of Grade 8 students – 33.5 per cent – met expectations regarding using ideas to understand written material last year, lower than in 2013-14 (39.4 per cent) and 2012-13 (35 per cent). The number meeting expectations for responding to text was 33.9 per cent last year, higher than the 30.3 per cent in 2014-15 but below the percentages of 40.1 and 41 per cent in 2012-13 and 2013-14. Thirty-seven per cent of last year’s Grade 8 students met expectations with regard to interpreting text, lower than in 2012-13 (43.9 per cent) and 2013-14 (47.5 per cent). Less than 40 per cent (38.6) of Grade 8 students met expectations for understanding key ideas last year, compared to 33.2 per cent in 2014-15, 46 per cent in 2013-14 and 46.5 per cent in the 2012-13 school year.
Grade 12 scores in provincial standards test for English language arts rose from 60.2 per cent in 2012-13 to 69.6 per cent in 2014-15 (comparable numbers were not included in the 2015-16 community report. For applied math the Grade 12 average in SDML was 68.4 per cent in 2014-15 compared to 50.4 per cent in 2012-13. The average score in math essentials went from 41.7 per cent in 2012-13 to 67.7 per cent in 2014-15.
The 2015-16 community report shows that Grade 12 SDML students scored lower than the provincial average in each of the three components of the English language arts standards test. In May of last year, the average score of SDML students in the responding to text component was 55.6 per cent, while the score for the writing task was 66.2 per cent and for the process booklet tasks it was 51.5 per cent. Province-wide, the averages were 62.7, 70.4 and 60.4 per cent, respectively.
SDML students lagged behind the provincial average in four of six categories of the Grade 12 essential mathematics achievement test. They scored 68.3 per cent in vehicle finance (the provincial average was 67.5 per cent) and 54.5 per cent in geometry and trigonometry (the provincial average was 49.7 per cent) while achieving 58.9 per cent in statistics, 46.3 per cent in precision measurement, 51.4 per cent in home finance and 57.6 per cent in probability. The provincial averages were 64.6. 53.6, 61.5 and 59.2 per cent, respectively.
It was the opposite scenario in the Grade 12 pre-calculus achievement test results, with SDML students outperforming the provincial average in five of seven curricular areas. They achieved 74.7 per cent in trigonometric (provincial average was 69.6), 79.7 in polynominal (provincial average 75.3), 67.7 per cent in trigonometry equations (provincial average 64.3), 73.6 in exponents (provincial average 69.3) and 74.4 per cent in radicals and rationals (provincial average 70.1). The only areas in which SDML Grade 12 students’ average scores were not better than the provincial average were transformations (57.8 per cent compared to 64.2 per cent) and binomial theorem (59.6 per cent to 63.1 per cent).
