Most area charter school grades are low

But many increased their test scores for second year in a row.

Dayton-area charter schools posted mainly low grades on the state report card last week, but for the second year in a row, a narrow majority of them increased their test scores from the previous year.

Nine of the 22 Montgomery County charter schools got overall grades of Fs, six had Ds, five received Cs and two earned Bs — Dayton Early College Academy (DECA) and Dayton Leadership Academies’ Early Learning Center, which serves only grades K-2.

Eleven of the 19 Montgomery County charters that received a performance index score saw it increase in the 2017-18 report card, after 12 of 20 schools increased the year before, according to Ohio Department of Education data.

Dayton SMART Elementary in east Dayton has shown the greatest test score improvement of local charter schools. The K-6 school’s performance index percentage increased from 47.9 to 53.1 last year, then soared to 61.6 this year, ranking behind only the two Dayton Early College Academy schools among local charters.

Dayton SMART Principal Cindy Koth cited a mix of good teaching and intervention, high expectations, family involvement and connecting lessons to real-world situations through projects. The school’s overall report card grade was a C.

“Students that are struggl i ng get s mall grou p s, and

students above level are getting enrichment activities, to try to make sure all kids grow,” Koth said. “We want our kids who are on-level to make one-and-ahalf years growth, and our struggling kids to make two years growth. We look really hard at the data and adjust our teaching and grouping to do that.”

Dayton Early College Academy (DECA) had by far the highest performance index among local charters, posting a 74.7 percentage that is on par with the Miamisburg and Vandalia-Butler school districts.

DECA also received As in year-over-year progress and gap closing between groups of students, en route to an overall grade of B, matching the Centerville and Kettering districts.

Pathway School of Discovery had the biggest decline in performance index from last year, dropping from 66.2 to 58.7 percent, although that still put it in the upper third of local charters.

Aaron Churchill, Ohio research director for the Fordham Institute — which studies education and spon- sors charter schools — said the “value-added” or student progress grades are critical data for low-income schools, because they are more “poverty-neutral” than straight test scores.

“You can see some differentiation in school quality via growth scores,” Churchill said. “There are some high-poverty public schools, both district and charter, that received an A on value-added . ... Some of the other metrics just show all Ds and Fs and there’s no differentiation so that’s not very helpful.”

Local charters were all over the map on the state’s progress grade. DECA and Klepinger earned As for their student growth, while Emer- son, Summit Dayton, Richard Allen II and Dayton Lead- ership Academies’ grade 3-8 school got Fs.

Because brick-and-mortar charter schools can only open in “challenged school districts” — Dayton, Trot- wood-Madison and Jefferson Twp. locally — this newspaper generally compares local charter school results to the results in those districts.

For the third year in a row, local charter schools posted a higher performance index on state tests than the com- bination of Dayton, Trot- wood and Jefferson schools, although the district schools cut that gap roughly in half. The median score for charter schools in 2017-18 was 48.5, while the median for those district schools was 45.9.

Dayton Public Schools again had the lowest-scoring individual schools, post- ing the eight lowest perfor- mance index scores. But a few of those scores could change, as both DPS and the state cited data reporting errors at DPS high school.

Also for the third year in a row, the district schools earned better stud e nt progress grades than the local charters, although that gap narrowed as well. T he median year-overyear growth grade for the charters was a D, while the median for the district schools was a C.

“I think this year is fairly similar to years past — Ohio charters performed pretty comparably to the district schools that are nearby,” Churchill said.

■ STEM School: The Day- ton Regional STEM School in Kettering earned B’s in achievement, student growth and overall grade on the state report card and posted an 85.0 performance index that matched Bellbrook for the third-highest score in the Dayton region. The STEM school, which focuses on science, technology, engineering and math for students in grades 6-12, is not technically a district or charter school.

Local charters were all over the map on the state’s progress grade. DECA and Klepinger earned A’s for their student growth, while Emerson, Summit Dayton, Richard Allen II and Dayton Leadership Academies’ grade 3-8 school got F’s.