West Fork Report Cards

West Fork Elementary School gets a “Needs Improvement” ranking, highlighted by “closing the gap” scores

     Iowa’s Department of Education has released their annual report cards on all Iowa schools. This is the first of a two-part article examining the scores for each school in the West Fork Community School District with comments from West Fork education officials.

     The West Fork Elementary School received the “Needs Improvement” rating with a score of 56.8, dropping from last year’s 67.2 score with a “Commendable” rating.

     The main reason for this downgrade in rating is the inclusion of the closing gap category, which tracks the achievement gap of students who are eligible for Free-or-Reduced Lunch (FRL), students with a Individualized Education Program (IEP) and/or students participating in the English Language Learning (ELL) program and was only nominal last year.

     The closing gap score is 22.7, with a state average of 50, a whole 27 points lower than in 2015.

     West Fork Middle School on the other hand, did not have much change to its score. It had the same exact score as in 2015, at 57.5 points. The Middle School was actually above the state average in the closing gap category, with 53.8, whereas the state average is 50.

      Read the full article in the Feb. 2 edition of the papers.