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By JOYANNA LOVE/ Senior Staff Writer

The Chilton County Schools district report card has been published by the Alabama Department of Education.

The report is generated using data from the ACT Aspire test, which is taken by students in third through eighth and 10th grades.

The recently released data marked Phase I of the district report card, and detailed learning gains for elementary and middle grades, student achievement for the entire system and local indicators. A letter score for the school system will not be determined until phase II in December 2017.

Chilton County Schools was given a learning gains combined score of 86.82 for reading and mathematics. This means that 86.82 percent of students in grades third through eighth showed improvement in test scores over the previous year’s scores. Pam Harris, system test coordinator, said the report card for the high schools learning gains will not be released until next year.

“We have worked tirelessly this year changing the mindset on how true learning occurs. We have made huge strides in student engagement. Our teachers and admins have visited other districts across the state and adopted new proven methods,” school superintendent Tommy Glasscock said. “We have implemented phase 1 of a technology initiative that will place an electronic device in the hands of every student …All math classrooms 9-12 now use Google classroom to deliver instruction.”

The district received a combined math/ reading score of 54.01. The school system’s Students Achievement score is based on the percentage of proficient students in reading and math based on the ACT Aspire results.

“I have real concerns with a single test determining student achievement. I believe we are certainly headed in a direction that will prepare all students to be ‘College and Career Ready’ in Chilton County,” Glasscock said

The school system received 100 percent on the local indicator portion of the report card.

Harris said each school system determines a local goal as its local indicator. For one school, it was to increase the number of high school students getting college credit. A bus route to get the students to the college dual-enrollment classes was established, increasing the number of students by 17 percent.

“All of our school met their local indicators,” Glasscock said.

The school system has a graduation rate of 86 percent, which is slightly below the state average of 89 percent.

“We have exceeded the state target for graduation rate,” Harris said.

The target for this year was 81. The system’s goal is to have a graduation rate of 90 by 2020.

The ACT Aspire results reports percentages for the amount of student scores according to a ranking system: “in need of support,” “close,” “ready” and “exceeding.” Ready means on grade level, and exceeding is best.

The 2015-2016 test results showed 40 percent of the Chilton County third grade students were deemed ready in math (15.7 exceeding). Of the reading scores for third grade, 16 percent scored ready in reading (10.6 exceeding). Third grade math scores showed 15.5 percent in need of support, while reading scores showed 45.9 percent in need of support.

A higher of percentage of students also scored ready in math than in reading in the sixth grade. Sixth grade results showed 34.5 percent of students as ready in math (16.2 percent exceeding). Sixth grade scores in reading showed 22.6 percent ready (13.7 percent exceeding). Math scores showed 11.7 percent of students in need of support, while 35.2 percent were in need of support for reading.

Eighth and 10th grade results showed a flip in the subject areas that students were deemed most in need of support for. Eighth grade results showed 47.3 percent in need of support for math and 31.7 percent in need of support for reading.

In 10th grade, 72 percent of students were in need of support for math and 47.8 percent in reading. Those deemed ready in math were 10.5 percent (2.9 percent exceeding) while 19.6 percent were ready (5.7 percent) in reading.

“The complexity of that 10th grade ACT Aspire is equivalent to the ACT,” Harris said.

Harris said the school system wants to see continued improvement and a part of that is programs like Reflex Math, which help students improve on fundamental math skills.