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to struggle. Just 11.04 percent of Baseline pupils scored at ready levels in literacy as did 25.15 percent of pupils in math, for example. A total of 12.68 percent of Stephens pupils achieved at ready or better levels in literacy as did 22.83 percent in math.

Other schools such as Jefferson Elementary, Forest Park Elementary, Booker Magnet Arts Elementary, Don Roberts Elementary and Forest Heights STEM Academy reported much greater percentages in the ready and exceeding ready categories.

“How do we get more of those?” Jeff Wood, chairman of the Little Rock Community Advisory Board, asked about the high performing schools. “That’s what the community wants to see — those amazing numbers.”

The results for the Little Rock district and all other districts and schools are on the state’s My School Info website: https://myschoolinfo.arkansas.gov.

Sheketa McKisick, the district’s federal Title I program director, described efforts by the Little Rock schools to develop their school improvement plans as called for by Act 930 of 2017 on school accountability.

“Different teams will go about it differently. Don’t expect to see the very same goal in every building,” McKisick said. “But you will see a focus on instruction and a focus on student achievement because that is what we do. And the plans should have a way of showing us that we have met our target or we have not.

“That target is moving us to the goal,” McKisick said, adding that the goals for a school must be specific, measurable, reasonable and timely.

McKisick said current efforts by schools differ from past improvement efforts when the state labeled low-performing schools and required them to meet certain mandates.

If you were designated as a “focus” school, she said as an example, there were 13 areas of the school’s operation or indicators that the school staff had to address. Often state officials would intervene directly in the school’s operation.

“That’s not the case anymore,” McKisick said. “Those 13 may not have been what you needed in your building but you were told that you had to examine them and initiate them in your plan. We are now in essence driving the bus.

“ESSA puts it back in our hands,” she said, and she expressed confidence in the district personnel, including principals.

Wood said the well-being of thousands of students is at stake.

“This is all about their future being bright and Little Rock being a successful city because we have a really good product coming out of Little Rock high schools,” Wood said. “We have got to push these numbers. For each individual kid, their lives have to be better 10 and 15 years from now.”