CCSD high schools lag behind state in some key scores

The Career and College Readiness Performance Index, or CCRPI, measures outcomes of schools across the state. At a meeting Thursday, the Clarke County School District Board of Education reviewed local scores.

The CCRPI, collected by the Georgia Department of Education, is a measure of school performance. Scott Barlament, Executive Director of Innovation, Strategy, and Governance for CCSD, presented the district’s scores Thursday. He discussed several metrics, including overall CCRPI scores, content mastery, progress, and equity scores. The results reflected change since last year, as well as since the beginning of the pandemic.

Compared to the state, elementary, middle and high schools in CCSD have lower overall CCRPI scores. While elementary, middle and high schools show improvements year over year, the district’s high schools are lagging behind. Scott Barlament:  

“High schools have lost some ground in terms of where they were last year, also the change from 2019 to 2024. A large part of that can be attributed to a low score in the Closing Gaps component for high schools.”

The Closing Gaps metric shows how students in different demographic groups score on English Language Arts tests. While the state score for high schools is 82, CCSD high schools earned a 34:

“Students in ELA at the high school level are not progressing, and that obviously needs to be an area of focus.”

Lessons from standout schools

Barlament also presented a list of schools with “standout” scores, including Clarke Middle School, which outpaced the state by improving their overall CCRPI score by almost 20 points since last year.

Board Member Linda Davis, who represents District 3, celebrated these schools and wanted to know what led to their success:

“What precipitated the changes here and not elsewhere? What are the conditions that allow some schools to be more successful than others?”

Barlament said that the key to improving CCRPI scores is through content mastery:

“CCRPI also takes into account developing students as well. The bubble for students is not just students moving onto proficient, it’s students moving out of that low category into that developing category as well.”

CCSD’s Board of Education will meet next on January 16th.