By Janet Lawler

Staff intern

Scores are out for the annual yearly progress objective of the No Child Left Behind Act. The Albert Lea School District did not make AYP and will need to work on improving those scores.

“We’re developing an action plan to help instructors help those particular students in their school who are not making adequate progress,” Judy Knutson said.

Knutson is the director of curriculum for the Albert Lea school district. She said the state does not describe those schools who did not make AYP as failing. If schools are not making AYP then they go into a variety of stages of improvement planning.

Making AYP is dependent on the scores of subgroups like Asian, Hispanic, black, white and special education. If just one subgroup does not meet AYP standards, the entire school does not meet AYP standards. Knutson said the school’s focus will be to increase reading and math scores.

“That is something the district is so totally focused on and dedicated to,” Knutson said.

Knutson said AYP scores can be misleading because there are many ways a school doesn’t make standards. She also said the standards are increasing every year, which is why it’s likely schools aren’t making AYP. It is the goal of NCLB to have every student proficient in reading and math by 2014.

School board chairman Bill Leland said this goal is “daunting.”

“I don’t consider us failing,” Leland said.

Knutson also said that as a district, students in the categories of Hispanic and special education were not making AYP in reading, and students in the category of black were not making AYP in math.

“We’re looking at data right now to see if we can find specifics we want to target,” Knutson said.

One example of that is looking at the subgroups of the AYP math scores, which could show whether geometry or algebra was the reason for not making AYP. Knutson said the district will be working to make sure all children are increasing in reading, math and science.

“We are not satisfied with these scores on reading and math,” Knutson said. “Our kids can do better, and it’s our job to figure out what actions to take to make that happen.

Superintendent Mike Funk declined to comment.