The Vicksburg Warren School District has a plan in place to see a drastic improvement in the district-wide accountability score and the score of each of the district’s schools in 2018.   

At their meeting Thursday evening, the VWSD board of trustees approved detailed instructional plans for each VWSD school, including the Academy of Innovation and River City Early College, which don’t receive their own accountability scores.   

The board approves instructional plans each year, but this year the plans are targeted at seeing specific growth for individual students instead of just a percentage of growth.

“We addressed individual children instead of estimates based on proficiency in percentages,” superintendent Chad Shealy said. “In the past, ours had been based on past performance. If we had increased by five percent we were going to set it at six or seven this year. We threw all that out the window and went to every individual child to get the achievement blocks.”

As part of the instructional plans, Shealy and the principals identified target accountability scores for the district as a whole and each of the 12 schools that will receive scores next year. Dana Road and Sherman Avenue will not receive scores next year on the accountability model because all third grade classes were moved under the umbrella of Vicksburg and Warren Central intermediate. 

The target scores are based on moving bubble kids — those students within three or five points of the next level of proficiency in math or reading — to a higher level, which is required for growth.

“We have an eight-layer cake and in that eight-layer cake, students are one of those layers,” Shealy said. “Within those eight layers there is a piece of icing, which is the move to the next group. Of those seven breaks, those top two you don’t have to grow children at all. Proficient or advanced, they just have to maintain. They don’t have to increase score at all; they don’t have to do anything. Everybody else that has students below that line, you have to move them an increased layer.”

The district target score for 2018 is a 631, a 129-point increase from this year when they received a 502. Under the current cut scores, a 631 would earn VWSD a B.

Shealy also worked with the principals at each school to develop plans and a target 2018 score based on seeing growth in students on the bubble. The target scores are:

•Beechwood: Moving from a 377 to a 421. If achieved, under the current cut scores Beechwood would remain a B.

•Bovina: Moving from a 420 to a 496. If achieved, under the current cut scores Bovina would improve from a B to an A.

•Bowmar: Moving from a 381 to a 417. If achieved, under the current cut scores Bowmar would remain a B.

•Redwood: Moving from a 404 to a 459. If achieved, under the current cut scores Redwood would move from a B to an A.

•South Park: Moving from a 324 to a 402. If achieved, under the current cut scores South Park would improve from a D to a B.

•Vicksburg Intermediate: Moving from a 283 to a 339. If achieved, under the current cut scores Vicksburg Intermediate would improve from a D to a C.

•Warren Central Intermediate: Moving from a 345 to a 381. If achieved, under the current cut scores Warren Central Intermediate would improve from a C to a B.

•Warrenton: Moving from a 398 to a 430. If achieved, under the current cut scores Warrenton would remain a B.

•Vicksburg Junior High: Moving from a 242 to a 409. If achieved, under the current cut scores Vicksburg Junior would improve from an F to a B.

•Warren Central Junior High: Moving from a 287 to a 350. If achieved, under the current cut scores Warren Central Junior would move from a D to a C.

•Vicksburg High: Moving from a 472 to a 628. If achieved, under the current cut scores Vicksburg would improve a D to a C.

•Warren Central High: Moving from a 586 to a 633. If achieved, under the current cut scores Warren Central would remain a C.