October 4, 2000

San Diego City Schools 2000 API Scores

Ninety-seven schools in San Diego Unified are eligible for cash performance awards from the state because of their strong student academic improvement during the 1999-2000 year, the California Department of Education announced Wednesday.

The schools met or exceeded all of their growth performance targets on the state’s Academic Performance Index (API), the benchmark used to measure public school improvement statewide. For every school, targets included schoolwide student academic growth as well as growth in ethnic/racial and socioeconomic student subgroups. The schools include 80 elementaries, 8 middle schools, and 9 high schools, and represent 68% of 142 district campuses that were measured for API growth.

By satisfying all targets, the schools are eligible to share in $577 million in performance awards and employee bonuses in two programs. The state will award the money later this year.

"I congratulate our schools for their hard work in improving the academic achievement of students," Superintendent of Public Education Alan Bersin said. "Our back-to-basics reforms in literacy and mathematics are providing stronger classroom instruction to benefit all children, and especially to close the achievement gap among groups of students. The commitment of teachers, principals and support staff will continue to bring further progress on our long road to high performance across the district."

Another 27 schools, for a total of 124 or 87%, met schoolwide growth targets. They do not qualify for cash awards, however, because they did not meet all subgroup targets. Their progress does put them on a strong track to qualify for the second round of incentives next year.

The state established the API in 1999 as the cornerstone of public school accountability. It measures academic performance, sets academic growth targets and monitors the growth over time schoolwide and for a school’s ethnic/racial subgroups of students. The API is presently based on Stanford 9 (SAT 9) standardized test data taken by all state public school students. The state reported Wednesday on API growth from 1999 to 2000, which it calculated by comparing spring 2000 and spring 1999 SAT 9 results.

The growth target for each school is the amount of improvement that the school is expected to make beyond its 1999 API base score, which is computed on an index ranging from 200 to 1000. The state has set an index score of 800 to represent a high-performing school.

No matter the 1999 performance, each school received a growth target to increase its score by at least 5% of the difference between the 1999 schoolwide score and 800 benchmark. Additionally, each school was asked to raise the 1999 score of every ethnic/racial subgroup by 80% of the schoolwide growth target.

For a school to be eligible for the cash awards, it must have met or exceeded the numerical schoolwide and subgroup target numbers.

Consider results at King Elementary in southeast San Diego, one of the district’s eight "focus schools" with special academic programs begun in September:

• The school had a growth target of 20 points. That represented 5% of the difference between its 1999 API score of 406 and the 800 goal.
• The school’s 2000 API improved 79 points to 485.
• The school also far exceeded the growth targets for its two subgroups:

a) The API growth target for Latino students was 16 points and the API grew 88 points to 475.

b) The API growth target for socioeconomically disadvantaged students was 16 points and the API grew 89 points to 485. (Students in this group are defined as either qualifying for free or reduced lunch or having parents neither of whom received a high school diploma.)

To qualify for the two programs offering cash awards, schools also need to test a high percentage of their students, excluding legal waivers—95% for elementaries and 90% for middle and high schools. King tested 100% of its students on the SAT 9.

The first cash award program makes available for school use up to $150 per pupil. The second program will award an estimated $800 to every school employee employed during the 1999-2000 school year, and an equal amount ($800 times the number of employees) for school use.

In December, following final state compilation of data, San Diego City Schools will submit to the Department of Education the names of schools where teachers may qualify for bonuses ranging from $5,000 to $25,000 per instructor. This third award program requires that schools meet several additional requirements beyond the first two incentive plans. The state will review data from all California districts and statewide will award $25,000 bonuses to 1,000 teachers, $10,000 bonuses to 3,750 teachers and $5,000 bonuses to 7,500 teachers.

The district has asked the state not to consider 12 schools for any cash awards pending a review of the number of parent waivers exempting students from testing at those schools. These schools had high percentage numbers of parent waivers for non-native student speakers of English. The district will report the results of its review by the end of the month. The schools are listed on the attachment.

Wilson Middle School and a district charter school, Nubia, do not qualify for cash awards because the state will not report a 2000 API growth score for the campuses due to their student demographics having changed significantly between 1999 and 2000. Their test results across the two years are not compatible.

Four schools—Baker and Kennedy elementaries, Pacific Beach Middle, and Scripps Ranch High—did not receive 2000 API scores from the state because of confirmed testing irregularities and are not eligible for cash awards. The district reported the names of the schools to the state after validating the violations. The state relies on districts statewide to report voluntarily on testing violations.

One elementary school, Oak Park, did not have its API growth score reported on Wednesday because it is being reviewed by the state for an alleged testing irregularity.

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THERE ARE 21 DISTRICT SCHOOLS NOT RECEIVING API GROWTH RESULTS:

1) Twelve schools did not have API growth information reported because they are under district review for having a significant proportion of students who were not tested:

--Elementary schools: Balboa, Chavez, Emerson/Bandini, Johnson, Kimbrough, Knox, Linda Vista, Longfellow, Sherman, Washington, and Webster.

--Junior high school: Memorial.

2) Four schools did not have API growth information reported because they were reported to the state for having irregularities in testing procedures during the spring 2000 SAT 9:

--Baker Elementary, Kennedy Elementary, Pacific Beach Middle, Scripps Ranch High.

3) Wilson Middle School and Nubia Leadership Academy, a charter school, did not have API growth information reported because the schools’ demographics changed significantly between 1999 and 2000 and their test results across the two years are not comparable.

4) The data for Oak Park Elementary is being withheld pending a state review of SAT 9 results.

5) The Charter School of San Diego has chosen to be assessed using an alternative accountability system being drawn up by the California Department of Education for non-traditional schools.