Maryland Report Card: Baltimore City outpaces rest of state in number of improved schools

The Baltimore City Public School System saw improvement in the number of schools that scored a three-star grade or above on Maryland’s school performance rating system, according to 2022-23 data released Wednesday.

The Maryland Report Card grades individual schools on a one-to-five-star scale. Over a third of city schools, about 35% of its 148 schools, scored a three or above. The district is the only one in the region that saw more schools gain stars than lose them over last year, and BCPSS has more improved schools, by number and percentage, than any of the other school system in the state.

The district has an average rating of 2.3 stars. Maryland’s overall average rating is 3.2 stars, a slight decrease from 2021-22.

This is the fourth year Maryland has used report cards and star ratings. A school’s performance is evaluated using a balance of academic and non-academic factors, such as standardized test scores and student and teacher surveys about school life.

Schools are compared using a 100-point accountability system tied to the federal Every Student Succeeds Act, a bipartisan 2015 replacement for the No Child Left Behind Act.

Carey Wright, the interim state superintendent of schools, cautioned comparing last academic year’s report to previous years because some metrics that were left out in previous years have returned, such as student absenteeism. Eighth grade social studies Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program standardized test scores were also added, as required by a 2017 law.

“… we cannot make perfect comparisons,” Wright said in a news release. “However, we celebrate those districts and schools that showed success and we will continue to support those that faced challenges.”

Student absenteeism was previously removed due to the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on attendance when classes went virtual. Statewide attendance has improved, but the number of students who were chronically absent for 10% or more of the school days is still worse than pre-pandemic. Schools that struggled with attendance likely saw their scores decline.

Wednesday’s report will become a baseline to compare future results, education officials said. Ratings seem to have shifted toward the middle with fewer one- and five-star scores.

In Baltimore and across the state, many schools kept the same rating they had the previous academic year from 2021-22. That means 68% of city schools had no change, 26% went up by a star, and 6% went down.

BCPSS had more room for improvement than other districts. In the region’s other five school districts — Baltimore, Anne Arundel, Carroll, Harford and Howard counties — almost a quarter of schools had no possibility of improving because they got ratings of five last cycle. Only one Baltimore school, the Baltimore School for the Arts, got a five in 2021-22. The arts school held onto its five stars, joined by Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, according to the school system.

Mark T. Sawyer, Poly’s principal, said the school maintains high marks through its initiatives that focus on the “whole child,” striving to teach life lessons beyond an academic setting. Teaching students from every zip code in the city means addressing a variety of needs, he said.

Coming out of the coronavirus pandemic, Poly has found that “our students need so many more supports in an overall sense,” such as more clinicians and social workers, Sawyer said.

Almost one in five Baltimore schools had no possibility of regressing because they got one star last time. For the other five districts, that applied to less than 2% of schools. And among those districts’ schools, 60% had no change, 7% went up, and 33% went down.

Baltimore City’s school system is “very pleased” to see this year’s improvements, Chief Academic Officer Joan Dabrowski said Wednesday, noting that more than a quarter of city schools went up by a star rating. Only nine schools decreased.

“The rapid improvements we’re seeing are signaling that we’re on the right track,” she said. The movement is a reflection of the school system’s extra funds in “very strategic ways,” such as “high-dosage” tutoring, extended learning program opportunities and more summer school possibilities “than ever before.”

For certain schools, like the 15 with a one-star rating, the district would be analyzing the data to respond the right way, Dabrowski said.

“We look closely at really tailoring our improvement efforts to make sure we’re getting at the right grade levels, the right content areas,” she said. “Because we have such detailed data, we can be very specific in our responsiveness to support schools.”

The report card also looks at high school graduation rates, growth in middle and elementary schools, the progress of English language learners and MCAP scores, among other factors.

Performance on standardized tests, particularly math, has not returned to pre-pandemic levels.

Maryland schools that changed star ratings were more than three times as likely to lose stars rather than gain them. In Anne Arundel County, 44 schools, about 38% of all schools, dropped a star. Three elementary schools saw improvement compared to the 2021-22 academic year.

Eighteen Baltimore County schools, about 11% of all schools, improved and 37 schools, or 23%, lost a star. Baltimore County Superintendent Myriam Rogers said in a statement that while the report card continues to “provide valuable insights about our schools,” it is still “important to understand that it provides a limited view of the work” the school system is doing.

Manchester Valley High School is the only Carroll County school that gained a star, moving from three to four. Nineteen Carroll County schools — half the system — dropped a grade.

Cynthia McCabe, Carroll County’s superintendent, said administrators received the report card data last week.

“[We are] still in the process of analyzing the factors that contributed to the decrease we saw,” McCabe said in a statement. “We are hearing that there are decreases all over the state.”

In Harford County, three elementary schools and one high school improved, while 20 others, about 38%, lost a star. Four elementary schools in Howard County improved by a star while 27 other schools, or 36%, declined.

Ratings of schools and districts can be found online at reportcard.msde.maryland.gov.