Schools Fail to Rise in Ranks

Fewer than 20% of Ventura County public schools improved their standing in a state achievement ranking last year, a sign many local campuses still have a long way to go to ensure all children master California’s rigorous new academic standards.

About half of the 153 schools included in the state ranking released by education officials Thursday showed no change, while one-third lost ground, according to a Times analysis.

The annual Academic Performance Index and accompanying school rankings are particularly significant this year, educators said, because they are weighted more heavily than ever on the results of tests based on standards -- a checklist of facts and skills that all students are supposed to be taught each school year.

In previous years the index was based solely on the Stanford 9, a basic-skills test that had little to do with what students were actually learning in classrooms.

“It’s becoming a better indicator of school performance, and everyone needs to pay closer attention,” said Charles Weis, Ventura County superintendent of schools. “Today is the day when the gauntlet is thrown down, which says, ‘Here is the standard for improvement.’ And it’s time to get serious.”

Still, the report -- based on standardized tests taken last spring by students in grades 2 through 11 -- shows Ventura County students are continuing to outperform their peers throughout California.

On average, the county ranks in the top half of schools statewide, and 24% of county schools have already achieved an API of 800 -- one of the state’s primary goals.

That could be one reason why the vast majority of Ventura and Orange county schools showed no progress on the ranking, while 45% of campuses in urban Los Angeles moved to a higher rank last year, Weis said.

In the academic ranking, schools received a score of 1 to 10, with 1 representing the bottom 10% of schools and 10 the top 10%. Elementary, middle and high schools are ranked against each other.

“When you’re doing a good job, as most suburban schools are, you don’t worry about the next thing coming down the road,” Weis said. “Right now there’s no crisis, as there was in Los Angeles. Once they decide to really embrace this, they will soar.”

Many principals and teachers in Ventura County say they have embraced the state standards and are doing everything they can to teach them to students.

Despite that emphasis, however, the highest index scores and rankings are at those schools in the county’s most affluent areas -- Thousand Oaks, Oak Park, Simi Valley, Camarillo, Ojai -- as they have been since Gov. Gray Davis’ public school accountability program began in 1999.

And that pattern will never change, some administrators say, no matter how much schools actually improve their day-to-day instruction.

“You can’t use the API to decide if a school is good or bad,” said Mike Vollmert, testing coordinator in the Conejo Valley Unified School District in Thousand Oaks.

“It’s tied to a standardized test that sorts itself out in terms of socioeconomic factors you don’t have any control over.”

Vollmert argued the index and rankings will only ever tell the public what it already knows: Schools in poorer areas where most parents have working-class jobs have a harder time educating students than those in affluent areas where most parents have college degrees.

But other administrators believe a sustained focus on standards-based teaching can make a difference -- even on the Academic Performance Index -- regardless of outside factors.

Barbara Wagner, an assistant superintendent in the Pleasant Valley School District, said one example is Las Posas Elementary School in Camarillo, which receives federal funds for its low-income students.

The school is ranked an 8 among other schools statewide and is a 10 among campuses with similar demographics, according to the latest state report, showing little variation from the district’s other, more affluent schools.

“Absolutely it’s possible,” Wagner said. “It’s a matter of focus, a matter of direction, and the attitude that we can make a difference.”

In the Los Angeles Unified School District, more than half of elementary campuses raised their state achievement rankings last year, far outpacing the rate of improvement of other elementary schools in the region, data released Thursday showed.

But Los Angeles elementary schools have a long way to go. On average, the district remains in the bottom half statewide even as it moved toward the middle of the pack.

Fifty-three percent of the district’s 431 elementary schools raised their state rank, on average from 3 to 4 on a scale of 1 to 10.

By contrast, just 28% of all other elementary schools in Los Angeles County showed any progress; they edged up slightly but remained in the fifth rank, where they were two years ago.

L.A. Unified officials said the elementary school performance shows that teachers are focusing on California’s tough academic standards, the subject material that now constitutes the single biggest factor in state achievement scores.

“That sets a foundation,” said Principal Carmel Vela-Madady of Erwin Street Elementary, which climbed four ranking slots since 1999, from the very low second statewide decile to the sixth, which is better than the state average.

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A full report on individual school rankings can be found at the State Department of Education’s Web site at https://api.cde.ca.gov.

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Times staff writer Duke Helfand contributed to this report.