For the first time, Seattle Public Schools unveiled school-by-school reports on the educational performance of its facilities gauging everything from standardized test results to how much kids like their school (not much!). While none qualified for the top rung of Seattle’s schools, the four public elementary through high school education facilities in the Capitol Hill area each scored well above average in the city. Below, we have information about upcoming meetings to discuss the scorecards while we also look at the citywide score distributions and inside some of the numbers at the public institutions educating many Capitol Hill kids.

Here is a look at some of the highlights from the four Capitol Hill-area schools we looked at in the new reports:

We have also attached the full PDF reports for each school to this post.

Across the city, the Seattle Times reports that 12 schools achieved the top tier ‘5’ rating: one K-8 school — Catharine Blaine — and 11 elementary schools: Bagley, Coe, Hay, Lafayette, Loyal Heights, McGilvra, North Beach, Schmitz Park, Thornton Creek, View Ridge and Wedgwood.

The Times also reports that 13 fell into the bottom ‘1’ tier:

Aki Kurose was the one middle school in that category, along with 12 elementary schools: Dearborn Park, Dunlap, Emerson, Gatzert, Hawthorne, Highland Park, Leschi, Madrona K-8, Martin Luther King, Northgate, Roxhill and West Seattle. All those schools have a high number of students from low-income families.

Seattle Public Schools says that higher scoring schools will have increased latitude for how they deploy some of their available budget. Meanwhile, the lowest scoring schools will see an influx of cash — about $400 per student. If scores don’t improve, the district may replace principals and staff.

 Public meetings to discuss the new reports will be held on the following dates from 7 to 8:30 PM.

 

• Nov. 29: Roosevelt High, 1410 N.E. 66th St.
• Nov. 30: South Lake High School, 8601 Rainier Ave. S.
• Dec. 6: Whitman Middle School, 9201 15th Ave. N.W.
• Dec. 7: Washington Middle School, 2101 S. Jackson St.
• Dec. 9: West Seattle High School, 3000 California Ave. S.W.

Here’s the announcement from Seattle Schools about the measurements:

 

Strategic Plan: Excellence For All

School Reports At Seattle Public Schools, we truly believe in excellence for all. It’s more than a saying; it’s our commitment to this community and the name of our five-year strategic plan to ensure every child graduates ready for college, career and life. Seattle Public Schools is providing detailed information on how each school, and the district overall, is performing. These reports also explain what we are doing to increase academic achievement and close the achievement gap in each school and across the district. The second annual District Scorecard shows how our students are performing across the district – from test scores to graduation rates. The Scorecard also shows how the district is performing operationally, in areas such as facilities, transportation and family satisfaction. District Scorecard For the first time, we are issuing individual School Reports. We want to give parents, students and the community important information so we can all learn from and act on the data. You can read about your school’s academic growth, student climate, accountability, family and staff engagement, and overall school performance. We hope you also take time to read the narrative page, where each school documents the steps it’s taking to ensure every student is achieving. School Reports We’ve been making progress at achieving excellence for all, and we want to thank our teachers, students and families for their hard work and dedication. However, we still have a lot of work to do. Using this essential data about how students are doing, we’re taking specific actions to close the gaps and to increase academic performance for every student in every school. Each school is developing a School Improvement Plan to implement specific ways to improve. What can you do? Read your school report. Attend one of the regional community meetings in November and December to talk with district and school staff. Contact or join the Building Leadership Team for your school. Join your schools’ Parent Teacher Student Association, and volunteer in your school. Seattle Public Schools is committed to giving our community information on performance, and we hope you’ll work with us to support every student’s path to excellence. For additional information please read through our Frequently Asked Questions To learn about how Seattle Public Schools groups schools by levels to provide a consistent way of looking at school performance across the system, click here: Segmentation: Using Data to Group Schools and Create Improvement Plans To see detailed survey results from families, students and staff at your school, click here:

http://www.seattleschools.org/area/strategicplan/schoolsurve

UPDATE: The Center for Reinventing Public Education has posted the Seattle Schools data to this map showing the locations of schools marked by color according to how they performed in the assessment. The color scheme is stoplight-style — green marks the highest scoring schools, yellow, the middle and red, the lowest scorers. The CRPE notes there are no high growth, high achieving schools in Seattle south of Capitol Hill.

 

View Seattle Schools Student Growth 2010 in a larger map