BUSD keeps API stride

Gary Moskowitz

Emilio Urioste, the principal at John Burroughs High School, knows

that success on the Academic Performance Index is just the beginning.

The school, with an overall 2003 API score of 714, jumped 44

points from last year on the statewide evaluation.

“We are elated. This means is that more is expected of us. The

issue now is that we are no longer your average, run-of-the-mill high

school. [The API] forces you to be ready,” Urioste said Friday.

The API measures school performance based on annual scores on

California Standards Tests, the California Achievement Test and the

California High School Exit Exam. Students take the exam in the

spring. The API has been administered since 1999. The state released

2003 API results Friday.

Ten of Burbank’s 11 elementary schools either met or exceeded

their target scores on the index. Providencia Elementary School

dropped by one point, from 748 to 747. The district’s three middle

schools and two high schools exceeded growth target scores.

The highest available score on the in dex is 1000. The state

growth target for all schools is 800, but each school is given a

growth target and student subgroup targets that they must make in

order to make their schoolwide API.

Three Burbank elementary schools -- Emerson, Jefferson and

Roosevelt -- scored higher than 800 on the index.

All but four schools in the district would be eligible to receive

state awards for their performance, but because of its budget

deficit, the state will not offer API awards this year, officials

said.

Emerson and Roosevelt elementary schools and John Burroughs High

all raised their scores by more than 40 points from 2002 to 2003.

Seven Burbank schools have raised their scores by more than 100

points since the 1999 administration of the tests.

The state will not sanction underperforming schools. No Burbank

schools participate in the state’s underperforming school program,

said Caroline Brumm, the district’s director of student assessment

and evaluation.

“We have made monu- mental changes in instruction and materials

and interventions,” Brumm said. “We have a non-Englis h speaking

population of 40% or higher districtwide, and we are moving more

schools toward 800.”

The district, in an attempt to continue to increase scores on the

index, has instituted extensive teacher training and put in place

ninth- and 10th-grade reading programs and two-year algebra courses.