By KELLIE KELLY
Guest Columnist
Have our kids started to catch up and recover from COVID learning loss? Are our schools working hard to help our students regain, recover, and succeed academically? Or are our schools focusing on all the wrong things? Let’s look at some data.
The 2022 ILEARN Data was recently released by the Indiana Department of Education (IDOE). You can view current and past data for ILEARN, ISTEP, SAT, AP and many other scores on the IDOE website at in.gov/doe/it/data-center-and-reports. It is important to know how your school district performed with respect to other similar school districts. Since HSE has historically been a high performing school district, it makes sense to compare HSE scores with the top 20 performing schools on the 2022 ILEARN test. Here is a chart for comparison.
These charts show ILEARN statistics for the top 20 school systems in Indiana. (Graphics provided)
For us old timers who have lived in Fishers for many years, it is a bit concerning to see Hamilton Southeastern Schools near the bottom of these charts in both Math and English/Language Arts. Historically, HSES typically places in the top five academically performing school systems along with West Lafayette Community School Corporation, Carmel Clay Schools, and Zionsville Community Schools. Another interesting takeaway from this data is how well Brownsburg Community School Corporation has performed on the ILEARN tests. Comparing and contrasting HSE and Brownsburg schools may yield some interesting facts.
Another way to see if your school district is strong and performing well is to look at and compare data from individual schools within your district. A strong performing school district will have little variation between schools, and all schools will demonstrate academic excellence. Here is a chart showing the 2022 ILEARN data for all schools in the HSE district.
These charts show ILEARN statistics each school within the HSE district. (Graphics provided)
ILEARN is taken in grades three through eight, so schools included are elementary, intermediate, and junior high schools.
As you can see from the data, there are very large differences between individual schools.
This is concerning, and HSES should offer analysis and explanation for the differences as well as plans to help increase scores in the poorer performing schools.
So, by looking at 2022 ILEARN data we can compare school districts and compare individual schools within the HSE district, but there are still a lot of unanswered questions.
How do we determine if there has been any recovery from COVID learning loss? One way is to look at scores for the same group of students before and after COVID. We have three years of data for ILEARN, 2019, 2021, and 2022. This is not a lot of data, so any conclusions drawn will need to be validated when more data is available. But, let’s look at what we have.
We have enough ILEARN Data to compare scores for the graduating classes of 2026, 2027, and 2028. We can compare more classes next year when more data is available. The blue bars in the charts below represent the number of students before COVID who were not proficient in Math or English/Language Arts (ELA) according to the 2019 ILEARN Data. We can clearly see with the orange bars which represent 2021 ILEARN data that each graduating class in both Math and ELA showed an increase in students who were not proficient. A reasonable explanation for the increase would be due to COVID learning loss. If schools are working to remedy the COVID learning loss, then we would expect to see with the 2022 ILEARN data that the number of students not proficient is decreasing and approaching the 2019 pre-COVID levels.
If we look at the chart for ELA, this is exactly what we see happening. The gray bars which represent 2022 ILEARN data show fewer students who are not at proficiency than the 2021 data. However, the data for Math tells a different story. There is very little difference between the orange and gray bars for Math for each class. This means that the number of HSE students not at proficiency in math for the graduating classes of 2026, 2027, and 2028 has not changed. According to this data there has been no recovery from COVID for Math.
Graphics provided
My purpose in presenting this data is to start some conversations. What can be done to improve academic excellence in our schools? What can be done to address COVID learning loss, especially for Math? What can be done to return HSE schools to the top of the charts when compared with other high performing school districts?
School board elections are approaching. Your vote will make a difference. If you are concerned about the academic performance of HSE schools, then please vote for candidates who want to return all HSE schools to high levels of academic excellence.
When compiling the table for top performing school districts, I looked at school systems that had at least 400 students tested. I just want to point out that there were some top performing smaller schools like Paramount Cottage Home, the Bloomington Project School, and Seven Oaks Classical School. I hope you will find this data informative. Please visit the IDOE website to do your own comparisons! Thank you! Kellie Kelly
Thank you for explaining the data so clearly. It is not surprising to see the results of Covid learning loss. We do need to see improvements in the coming years. As a community we need to support our educators and vote for those who want to achieve academic excellence.
What differentiates those school board candidates who desire a ‘return to excellence’ from those who do not as the final paragraph insinuates ?
What differentiates those school board candidates who desire a ‘return to excellence’ from those who do not as the final paragraph insinuates ? My guess would be the (R) next to the name on the ballot.
Dear Frank,
I encourage you to watch past school board meetings. You can view them at this site. https://www.hseschools.org/meet-hse/board. This will give you a good idea about current school board members and what interests they are promoting. You can view bios about new candidates running for school board at https://www.friendsoffishers.com/meet-our-school-board-candidates. I will let you do your own research and draw your own conclusions. If you are interested in my opinion, I believe the majority of current school board members are pushing an exclusive policy agenda of equity initiatives. The attention, focus, and time spent on equity initiatives is resulting in a reduced emphasis on academics and student learning. I believe academics and student learning must always be the main focus of any school board.
Here is a quote from https://www.edutopia.org/five-characteristics-effective-school-board.
Effective Boards Focus on Student Achievement
“The best school boards understand that student learning is job one. This emphasis necessarily means that policies and resources of schools are targeted to promote achievement for all students. School practices, which have their genesis in policy, ought to have a laser-beam orientation on high standards, a rigorous curriculum, and high-quality teachers. Issues a school board must consider are evaluated against the contribution toward student learning — the core business of schools.”
What we need to ask our current school board is how have all the equity initiatives contributed to student learning? Show us the data, because the ILEARN data isn’t looking all that great.
Thanks for the thoughtful note Kellie.
While I fully agree that school systems primary task is the conventional education of students, in these current times, it does make one pause & consider if such initiatives might form the building blocks that someday result in fewer tragic school shootings given that many (most ?) of these events have been perpetrated by current or recently former students.
Something is indeed wrong in American schools & it goes much deeper than scholastic test scores.
School age children should be having the time of their lives, not loading rifle magazines with thoughts of retribution on their mind.
Surely there’s a balance that smart people can find where traditional academics & the whole person are both developed for the betterment of everyone. Operative word being ; balance.
.
Well, Frank, it looks like we disagree. I think teachers should teach and leave mental health issues to professionals trained to handle mental health issues. Did you know that some teachers refused to teach SEL material on the grounds that they felt they weren’t qualified and could cause more harm than good? I respect those teachers. One school board member went on and on about data, and how important data is to make policy. Well, here is a lot of data that shows a lot of HSE students are below grade level. I don’t think the school board members are paying attention to this data. But, it will be up to the parents to decide what data they choose to listen to come November.
Actually we really don’t disagree – I’m fully on board with the three ‘R’s’ being the top priority for any school system.
I just think that figuratively speaking & given the abundant resources available, we should aspire to be able to walk AND chew gum at the same time.