La Cañada Unified schools earn Honor Roll status, recognized as ‘positive outliers’
In a letter sent out to La Cañada Unified School District families Monday congratulating recently graduated La Cañada High School seniors and promoted eighth-graders, Supt. Wendy Sinnette announced two recent pieces of good news for the district.
On May 31 La Cañada, Paradise Canyon and Palm Crest elementary schools, as well as La Cañada High School 7-12, were named as 2018-19 Honor Roll Schools by data science nonprofit Educational Results Partnership under the sponsorship of Campaign for Business and Education Excellence. The district was among 26 statewide given such a distinction.
Honor Roll schools demonstrate evidenced-based instructional practices, efficient data and assessment systems to monitor student performance and resources and guidance to support schools’ efforts to prepare students for college and careers, Sinnette said in the letter.
Another nod to the district came in a report published by the Learning Policy Institute earlier last month, “California’s Positive Outliers: Districts Beating the Odds,” in which La Cañada Unified was named a Top 5 positive outlier district for the performance of its Hispanic students.
With a reported enrollment of 4,058, students who identify as Hispanic account for 12% of the total population, according to the report. Those students outperformed predictions made for their subgroup given the socioeconomic status of the district, the report explains.
“Despite persistent achievement gaps throughout much of the state and the nation, students of color and students from low-income families in these positive outlier districts are beating the odds and achieving at higher levels than their peers of similar socioeconomic background in the rest of California,” report co-author Stanford University Prof. Sean Reardon was quoted in Sinnette’s letter.
The superintendent congratulated students, teachers and staff for achieving such distinctions.
“We are very proud of you,” she wrote. “Enjoy a much-deserved summer break after all of your hard work this school year!”
