Middle Schools Added To AYP List ; Mountain View, Eagle Ridge Made Passing Grades Under No Child Left Behind

By ELAINE D. BRISEO Journal Staff Writer

Two Rio Rancho middle schools have learned that they made passing grades with the state, contrary to earlier reports.

Each year, the state determines whether a school has made adequate yearly progress, measured by guidelines outlined in the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

Schools are evaluated mainly on student performance and participation in math and reading tests administered in grades 3-9 and grade 11. Other factors are graduation rates for high schools and attendance rates for elementary and middle schools.

School testing data also must be organized to measure the performance of not only the entire student body but designated subgroups — special education students, English- language learners, economically disadvantaged students, and the ethnic groups of American Indian/Alaskan native, Asian/Pacific Islander, black, Hispanic and white.

If a school does not meet standards in even one group, the entire school is designated as not meeting adequate yearly progress.

Mountain View principal Kathy Pinkel said that initially her school missed AYP by onesixth of 1 percent. Initially, the state reported that the school’s students with disabilities did not meet standards in reading. A recalculation showed they did, meaning the school can now be designated as meeting adequately yearly progress.

“When the initial rating came out and we did not make it, it was hard for me to tell my staff,” she said. “I think the standards for making AYP get more challenging every year. I am very proud of my staff, students and parents for continuously finding ways to respond and meet those standards.”

Mountain View was not the only middle school to get good news.

The district learned that Eagle Ridge Middle School’s designation also had been changed to meeting adequate yearly progress. In the case of Eagle Ridge, it was not a miscalculation that led to the change.

RRPS spokeswoman Kim Vesely said that although the school did not quite reach the bar set out by state standards, it made enough improvement on its test scores to be considered meeting adequate yearly progress.

Computing a school’s progress in that way is called Safe Harbor and is used to reward schools that have made significant improvement over the previous year’s test scores.

Eagle Ridge principal Debby Morrell said she learned the news about 3 p.m. Tuesday but was at a meeting out of the building so hadn’t yet told her staff. She said when the initial ratings came out and her school failed to make the grade, she was shocked because of all the progress it had made.

“I am so ecstatic about this,” she said. “I will tell you, our kids worked diligently and our staff even more diligently. This validates all that hard work they put in.”

The two middle schools join Enchanted Hills, Maggie Cordova, Rio Rancho and Vista Grande elementaries as the other RRPS schools to make AYP. The district has 15 schools.

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