Both the East and West Tallahatchie school districts have received overall higher marks on a state accountability scale for the 2021-22 school year.
On Tuesday morning, the Mississippi Department of Education presented unofficial 2021-22 district and school accountability ratings to the Commission on School Accreditation. The results were to be made official Thursday by the Mississippi State Board of Education.
The Mississippi Statewide Accountability System is an A-F accountability system whose grades reflect how well schools and school districts are performing.
Grades are based on student achievement, student growth, graduation rate, student participation in testing and other academic measures.
On a districtwide basis, both the East and West Tallahatchie school systems improved from a grade of F to a grade of D, based on a comparison of 2018-19 and 2021-22 school year results.
Among individual schools, Charleston Elementary and Charleston Middle schools improved from F to D, while Charleston High, R.H. Bearden Elementary and West Tallahatchie High maintained their previous D ratings.
MDE did not release new district and school letter grades for 2019-20 and 2020-21 due to the pandemic, effectively carrying over 2018-19 results.
East Tallahatchie Superintendent Marvell Hudson
Prior to the pandemic, East Tallahatchie had graded F for two years of testing, 2017-18 and 2018-19. West Tallahatchie as a district graded D in 2017-18 and F in 2018-19.
Both superintendents seem heartened by the latest results.
“The trajectory for the East Tallahatchie School District since COVID-19 raised its ugly head has been, ‘From pandemic to proficiency,’” first-year ETSD Superintendent Marvell Hudson said in a statement Tuesday.
“According to both the qualitative and quantitative systems that we have put in place in the district, we believe that we are moving in the right direction,” Hudson added. “It starts with a vision; our vision is that all children will become proficient by the 2022-23 school year, [meaning] all students will be functioning on grade level in all content areas (reading, writing and arithmetic, etc.).”
Johnnie L. Vick was ETSD superintendent when state tests and assessments were given during the previous school year, but Hudson said one measure is constant: “According to the Mississippi Department of Education’s Accountability Model, every student is expected to grow academically.”
He explained that ETSD has witnessed “pockets of success” with the model.
“Some areas we are glowing in and some areas we are growing in,” he noted. “For example, a large population of our scholars saw growth from the previous school year. Our Algebra 1 students scored in the top percentile in the state. Our overall district growth was the major contributor to moving our accountability status.”
Hudson said the district “will continue to make rigorous assessments that reflect both test complexity and difficulty” and “will continue to increase the number of students that perform at the proficient and advanced levels.”
In the West Tallahatchie School District, Superintendent Dr. Sherry Ellington said in a statement Tuesday that the accountability results make the district “more determined to continue with developing a culture with a mindset that we are capable of closing the achievement gap that has persisted so long in the district.”
While saying the district “did not grow as much as hoped” on state assessments, she said the WTSD is “looking forward to developing strategies to overcome the problems that were transparent from the results.”
According to MDE, federal law requires all states to assess students annually in English Language Arts (ELA) and Mathematics in grades 3-8 and once during high school.
Mississippi law requires schools and districts to earn annual A-F grades based on student performance and growth.
West Tallahatchie Superintendent Dr. Sherry Ellington
Mississippi’s accountability system includes the following components:
• Student proficiency and growth rates in ELA and Mathematics in grades 3-8
• Growth of the lowest-performing 25% of students in ELA and Mathematics
• Science proficiency in grades 5 and 8
• English Learner progress toward becoming proficient in the English language
• Performance on the ACT and high school Algebra I, English II, Biology and U.S. History assessments
• Student participation and performance in advanced coursework such as Advanced Placement and dual credit/dual enrollment courses
• Four-year graduation rate
Some area A-rated school districts for 2021-22 are Grenada, Lafayette County and Oxford.
Some area B-rated school districts are South Panola, Sunflower County Consolidated and Water Valley.
Area C-rated school districts include Cleveland, Coffeeville and Quitman County.
In addition to Tallahatchie, area D-rated public districts include Clarksdale Collegiate Charter School, Coahoma County, Greenwood-Leflore Consolidated, Leflore Legacy Academy Charter School and North Panola.
The only area F-rated school district is Clarksdale Municipal.
