BISD PLUMMETS FROM "RECOGNIZED" TO MERELY "ACCEPTABLE"

By Juan Montoya
Barring a merciful granting of massive exceptions to one campus and favorable "hand grading" of science TAKS exams in another, the Brownsville Independent School Distirct might as well accept the fact that it will drop from the "recognized" rating it has boasted about to merely "acceptable" for the next two years.
Adminsitrators and two school board members tried to sugar-coat the change complaining that the tests this year were "too hard," that the grading had changed, and that if not for one student on one campus, the district might have remained in the exalted "recognized" rating just one notch below the top "exemplary" rating.
But at least two board memebrs questioned the presenters sharply and asked pointed questions on why the administration had not used the previous grades as benchmaarks to prevent the drop.
"I've asked this question since I came on board," said trustee Christina Saavedra. "Have we evaluated all the programs so that we can see where we're at?"
Vasquez and Peña said that they hadn't.
"Where did we go wrong?" asked BISD chairperson Catalina Presas-Garcia. "Two years ago we were exemplary, or recognized, and now we drop to acceptable."
When compared to 2010 scores, the latest BISD scores indicate gains in 8 grade level and subject areas and decreases in 17 others.
Two remained the same.
Overall, 80 percent or more of all district students met expectations in math, reading and science and 93 percent met expectations in social studies and writing. Areas tested include math, reading/English language arts, writing, science, and social studies.
Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction Berta Peña tried to paint a rosy picture for the board and audience saying that even though the lower scores might have been the results of changes in the testing, there were "points of pride" such as the gains by Special Education students in reading and math.
"We have made great strides," she said. "We are holding on."
Raul Vasquez, director for Assessment, Research and Evaluation, said he wasn't "going to lighten this. All populations lost ground. "The way the state rates the disticts, if one student in one campus doesn't score well, the entire district drops in ratings."
Trustee Minerva Peña babbled inanely about how she hqad attended a half-hour seminar where the new STARs testing to be used by districts next year was discussed and that she found it to be very effective. She recommended that the administrators attend one, only to be told that they already were being briefed by Region One representatives.
"I got it!" she exclaimed. "And I'm not a school teacher by trait (?)."
"We're not where we want to be," admitted asst. superintendent Peña. "But the locomotion (?) is already moving and we're going at 100 miles an hour."
Trustee Rolando Aguilar also chimed in and cheered the teachers and students even if the rating had dropped.
"Thank you for a good job we're doing," he said. "The foundation is good."
After blaming the results on the difficulty of the tests and the fact that the district has a majority Hispanic and economically disadvantaged student population, Vasquez said the district would submit petitions to the Texas Education Agency that one campus be granted exemptions to try to bring it up from an unacceptable to an acceptable rating. On another campus, he said, the district would petition the TEA to have the science tests "hand-graded" to see whether it could be raised above the ratings.
"If the results do not come back in our favor, the highest our district could get is acceptable," he said.
"There's a flaw somewhere in the system," countered Presas-Garcia.
And, as if she was speaking in the third person, trustee Peña concluded that "You're only as strong as your weakest link."