8 schools in Southeast Tennessee receive “F” on state report card
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (WDEF)- The state of Tennessee has released report cards for every school across the state.
These grades are based on statewide test results.
Kaylee Joslyn, the member services director for the education advocacy group Professional Educators of Tennessee, said, “It takes a lot into account but it is important to remember that this is just a snapshot. It is just a moment in time they are pulling these numbers and data from, and it is not necessarily all encompassing.”
When we learned these results were released on Thursday, we wanted to check every single school grade across the News 12 viewing area.
We counted 153 different school grades across our Tennessee counties, and the results we found across our viewing area were certainly a mixed bag.
Eight Schools in our area received a failing grade, six of them in Hamilton County.
The list of these are:
-Spring Creek ES-Calvin Donaldson ES-Brown Academy-Harrison ES-Orchard Knob MS-Howard Connect Academy-Tracy ES-Polk Virtual School
Four of these were elementary schools, which caught the eye of Joslyn.
She said, “From third to fifth, we see they are a level one in growth, from sixth to eighth also level one, but then 9th through 12th grade, we see they are a level five in achievement. It is really interesting to see the difference between the youngest and oldest grades.”
She says it’s important to keep an eye on the cohort of elementary students, primarily now in the fourth and fifth grades, who began school during the thick of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Joslyn said, “They were the most affected by Covid. They missed a lot of those key, developmental school years. They are now at the age where we are getting their data, and how they’re performing.”
It is important to note that 18 schools in our area received an A grade.
Those schools were:
-Apison ES-Thrasher ES-Daisy ES-McConnell ES-Ooltewah ES-Charleston ES-Fraizer ES-Spring City ES-Dayton ES-Loftis MS-Whitwell MS-McMinn Central HS-East Hamilton HS-CSAS Upper-CSLA-CCA
-STEM School at Chatt State-Collegiate High at Chatt State
Every other school ranged from a B to a D grade, with elementary and middle schools most commonly receiving a B grade while middle schools were more likely to have a C grade.
But no matter where your school graded, Joslyn says it is important to keep these scores in context.
Joslyn said, “If you’re seeing a lower grade than you want, it should start that conversation in how we should help our students and our educators.”
To see your school’s grade, we have a link to them here.
