Elizabethtown, N.C — Bladen County students joined students across the state with overall gains during the 2022-2023 school year.
State test results from the 2022-2023 school year presented to the State Board of Education reveal that students in Bladen County continue to recover from learning loss due to the Covid pandemic.
“We are incredibly proud of the growth our students have made,” said BCS Director of Accountability and Title 1, Brendan McCarthy. Overall, 75% of Bladen County schools met or exceeded growth.
The following schools met growth:
- Bladen Lakes Primary School
- Elizabethtown Primary School
- Elizabethtown Middle School
The following schools exceeded growth:
- Bladenboro Primary School
- Dublin Primary School
- Bladenboro Middle School
- Bladen Early College High School
- East Bladen High School
- West Bladen High School
*East Arcadia School met growth; however, it is important to note they did not have enough data to receive a school performance grade for the 22-23 school year and are therefore not included in the overall percentage of schools in Bladen County that met or exceeded growth.
“While the state’s current accountability model leaves much room for improvement, I’m grateful the efforts of our students, teachers, staff, and administrators are beginning to be reflected in the data,” said BCS Superintendent Dr. Jason Atkinson.
Tammy Howard, senior director of accountability and testing for the N.C. Department of Public Instruction shared, “As we look at the data, the school performance grades and other information from the 2022-23 school year, it’s very important to note that while it’s informative, it is limited, and it is discouraged to make comparisons to 2018-19, which is prior to the pandemic.” She said 2018-19 is provided as a reference point only, not for the purpose of drawing linear comparisons.
The A-F school performance grades that schools received for 2021-22 and in 2022-23 were affected by the formula used to determine those grades because student performance on the state tests far outweighs the credit schools earn for the progress students make on the same tests from one year to the next. Eighty percent of the grade is for the percentage of tests earning a score of at least grade-level proficient; 20 percent is for growth, measured by a statistical model that compares each student’s predicted test score, based on past performance, against his or her actual result.
Even as most schools achieved at least expected growth, the A-F performance grades of many schools were depressed by lower-than-usual percentages of students earning a score of grade- level proficient. With the weighting of 80 percent on the test scores and other achievement data, the school performance grades have shifted downward, consistent with the impact of the pandemic on test scores. For the 2022-23 school year, the percentage of schools with a grade of D or F decreased to 35.4% from 42.3% in 2021-22 but remained higher than the 21.8% in 2018-19.
McCarthy, echoes Atkinson and Howard regarding the current accountability model, “as we celebrate the achievements of our students, staff and schools, its critical to acknowledge that, the 80/20 model is not an accurate representation of the learning that happens daily in our schools.”
For the 22-23 school year, the overall growth achieved by Bladen County Schools was tremendous—Elizabethtown Middle School saw a 22.9% increase in growth and an 8.3% increase in achievement [test scores] leaving the school just 4 points shy of moving from an F to a D. However, if the state’s accountability model was 70/30 or 50/50, Elizabethtown Middle School would have an improved performance grade with wide margins.
As the 2023-2024 school year gets underway, Bladen County Schools will continue to advocate for accountability reform while maintaining its focus on school improvement and strengthening partnerships with school families and communities to collaboratively support student growth.
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