Lake Superior School District misses federal assessment mark

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The Lake Superior School District failed to meet federal No Child Left Behind standards, according to a report released last week.

The district is not making adequate yearly progress, or AYP, according to the Minnesota Department of Education. AYP is an assessment of how much progress a district is making toward federal mandates. It is a combined assessment of student test scores, teacher qualifications, and other measurements.

Not meeting AYP can mean financial sanctions and can lead to school restructuring and a choice for students to transfer schools. To make AYP, all subgroups of students in the district must be deemed proficient in math and reading, measured by their performance on the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments II test.

Corey Knighton, the assistant principal at Two Harbors High School and the district curriculum coordinator, said he had not studied the results enough to comment Tuesday.

Students in the district are above the state average when it comes to standardized reading test scores, while their math scores lag behind. Test results show 76 percent of Lake Superior School District students are meeting the proficiency benchmark, while 25 percent did not make a proficient score on the reading portion of the MCA II last spring. That compares with the state average of 67 percent of students being proficient in reading and 28 percent not proficient.

Math was the district’s weak point.

Tags: two harbors, lake superior school district, schools, news, ayp