Regional districts fare well on state report cards

The Ohio Department of Education's report cards for public schools in each of Ohio's counties showed regional districts doing well, the COVID-19 pandemic notwithstanding.

The department annually releases its findings, grading five components — achievement, early literacy, graduation, progress and gap closing — with ratings of up to five stars.

Gap-closing measures the reduction in education gaps for students in at-risk subgroups, while Progress looks closely at the growth all students make, based on past performances. Achievement represents whether student performance on state tests met established thresholds and how well students performed on state tests overall. Early literacy measures reading improvement and proficiency for students in grades kindergarten through three, while graduation examines four- and five-year graduation rates.

How they fared

"We are very excited," said Benton-Carol-Salem School District Superintendent Guy Parmigian, whose district outshined many others in the area. "It's hats off to our teachers and our students and families who worked so hard to get these results."

Parmigian said his district's excellent results came from the investments of time and effort by those in the schools and the community at large.

"It's really theirs to celebrate," he said.

Proud of achievements

"We are really proud of our teaching staff for the achievements our students are showing," said Bob Falkenstein, superintendent of the Gibsonburg Local School District. "There is an overall improvement in school culture right now."

Falkenstein said much of his district's achievement is driven by many new staff and faculty members who have brought a heightened sense of spirit to instruction, while renewing old traditions that had fallen by the wayside, like the annual bonfire and "snake dance."

"We brought it back," Falkenstein said. "We're doing things differently this year."

Calling his district's newfound enthusiasm "infectious," Falkenstein said, "We are ripe to do things differently and we are seeing that the excellence of our team is apparent in the attitudes of our students.

"We are intentionally putting our faith in our staff members. When they're excited, our students get excited.

Students' needs being met

"We're prioritizing the school culture right now, so that we can teach and just (allow them to) learn," said Karen Robey, Gibsonburg director of teaching and learning, about her district's students. "We're really proud of how we're taking care of their social and emotional needs, because we know that they need to benefit, too."

"Generally speaking, we're pretty pleased with the report card overall," said Lucas Messer, superintendent of the Clyde-Green Springs School District. Messer noted his district has areas to work on and celebrate.

The Clyde-Green Springs district performed well in the area of gap closing, and Messer expressed pride in the overall creativity of his staff in fostering administrative solutions to problems that added up to impressive achievements over time.

"We've invested a lot of time and training in those kids," Messer said, also pointing to the district's high graduation rate of nearly 99%, that drove the five-star rating.

"That's definitely something that we're proud of as well."

Preparing students for life

Lakota School District Superintendent Chad Coffman said, "We're here to get kids ready for life after school, so having a graduation rate of five stars is the most important thing."

He praised the teachers and staff members in his district for striving to elicit the best out of students, "not giving up on kids and challenging them and giving them what they need."

Michael Ferguson, Genoa Area Local School District superintendent, said his district has seen strong improvements among various subgroups of students.

"The Gap Closing is what we're happy about," Ferguson said. "I think we do a very good job of targeting the needs of our kids on an individual basis."

Ferguson's assessment of his personnel's purpose echoed Coffman's, noting that the Genoa district has recognized the need to teach skills required of students as they move past school and into society.

"We've really made a big effort in the last few years to tie our content to careers," he said. "It's the age-old adage, 'Why do I have to learn this?'"

Mary Schaeffer, superintendent of the Woodmore Local School District, said she and her staff will concentrate on differentiation in instruction to help raise the district's numbers in Progress and Gap Closing.

"The common denominator between Progress and Gap Closing is subgroups of kids," Schaeffer said. "You're looking at whether you're growing your students."

Things to celebrate

She added, however, the district has much to be proud of regarding its Achievement, Graduation and Early Literacy numbers.

"We have a lot of things to celebrate, she said.

Fremont City School District Superintendent Jon Detwiler and Patrick Adkins, superintendent of the Port Clinton School district, had both previously noted that their districts had excelled in some areas on the report cards, while remaining challenged in others, mostly due to missed educational opportunities resulting from the pandemic. Adkins and Detwiler had also expressed encouragement that their districts had shown overall improvement.

mmagnuson@gannett.com

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This article originally appeared on Fremont News-Messenger: Regional districts fare well on state report cards