District meets MCAS AYP
By Caitlyn Kelleher

JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

The Ashburnham-Westminster Regional School District met the state requirements of improvement on the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS).

Superintendent Michael Zapantis presented the district's overall scores as well as the school by school reports to the regional school committee on Sept. 24.

"We've met all of our Adequately Yearly Progress as a district as a whole and as individual buildings," Zapantis said.

He said that the district math and English/ Language arts scores are higher than the state averages, except in special education. He said there is improvement being made every year but that it will take more work to reach the last levels of success.

The state goal is to have all students scoring in the advanced and proficient range by 2014.

"Improvement becomes more and more difficult every year," he said.

It is harder to improve because there is less room for improvement because they are closer to the goal.

"This is taken very, very seriously," Zapantis said.

The administration and teachers will be meeting to review the scores, the problem questions and other details of the test results.

Math has gone through the first years of the curriculum renewal cycle and improvements were seen in the students' test scores. Zapantis said district officials are hoping to see the same type of results on the English/ Language Arts test in the upcoming years as that subject moves through the review process.

"By the time the kids graduate from Oakmont (Regional High School) 100 percent of the kids have passed the MCAS," Zapantis said. "It doesn't mean they've all passed the first time."

The special education subgroup of 268 students did not meet the state average or the improvement schedule set by the state in either math or English as a district-wide group.

"It's a concern shared by almost every superintendent in the state," Zapantis said.

Committee Chairman David Christianson asked if there is anything the committee needed to do either the budget or programmatically to help with the improvements.

Zapantis said either of those may become an issue but the administration and the teachers are still reviewing the details of the results.

"It's about meeting the needs of this particular subgroup," he said.

Individual test scores should be mailed to parents by the beginning of October, Zapantis said. The district has received the scores for the 10th graders who took the test but has not received the scores for the third, fifth or eighth graders.

In other business:

 Committee member Leonard Beaton expressed concern that the new bus driver's policy set the minimum age of a driver at 18- years-old instead of 21. Laura Weiderman, the chairman of the transportation subcommittee, said that they can't set the age at 18 because of age discrimination rules.

Weiderman said with in the contract bid the committee will be setting mandatory experience levels and safety records, which should indirectly cover Beaton's concerns. She also said that the district will retain the right to remove any driver that the superintendent of schools objects too.