On Wednesday, December 13, Tumwater School District (TSD) Board Superintendent Kevin Bogatin shared the district’s latest data from fall semester student performance to date.
6,827 students are enrolled in the district for 2023, and 71.4% of students enrolled for 90 calendar days or more are present for at least 90% of the school days.
Bogatin showed a graphic of TSD’s five-year trend in English Language Arts (ELA) with percentages just above the state average. For 2023, the state average was 50.70%, and TSD’s average was 57.9%. These figures reflect the percentage of students performing at or above grade-level standards based on student scores in several statewide standardized assessments.
“...Whether that makes you feel better or worse, we are better than the state by about 8% and we're all doing pretty poorly,” said Bogatin.
Bogatin said that the district aims to bring the number back up to pre-pandemic levels, though the district hasn’t historically scored above 68%.
“I think people that don't look at this data every day say it's a little bit alarming. You think it's an indictment and a failure of the system, and you go back historically and you're seeing we, probably in ELA, rarely have been above 68-70%,” explained Bogatin.
For mathematics, Bogatin said the state average dropped to 39.1%, while TSD recorded a 44.5% trend. Both rates are lower than pre-pandemic levels of 48.9% for the state and 56.4% for TSD.
“We are in the 40s, the state is in the 30s, trend pre-covid was in the 50s. We're not killing it in math – not only in this district, not only in this state. Nationwide, this is a lagging concern,” Bogatin said.
Bogatin said that reading comprehension has an impact on math performance and indicated that TSD will work to improve reading standards to enhance not only language arts but also math achievement, explaining that many types of math require familiarity with a specialized vocabulary and ability to discern relevant details and operational prompts in text.
He also emphasized that while TSD hopes to boost multidisciplinary proficiency among all students, some performance metrics can also be affected by demographic inequities that may be beyond the scope of curricular improvement alone.
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JW
When will they come begging to the taxpayers again for increased money to fund more administrators?
Do society a favor and vote no on each and every school initiative and levy and starve the special-interest dinosaur known as the public school system.
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 Report this
jslosson
Folks who criticize the schools are not actually familiar with anything that goes on inside those schools. Tumwater is doing a great job even though the legislature has developed a bad funding model. Before you blame the schools, get your kids to school on time, with some breakfast in their stomachs, with enough sleep, and courteous & attentive behaviors. Right now 10% of the kids are messing up school for the other 90%.
Wednesday, December 20, 2023 Report this
TumschoolTeacher
This superintendent will only make things worse. Wants more money just to waste it. Look at his history in his previous district. Long history of waste. No one could work with him and he was a horrible instructional leader. This board should have never hired him and we are all paying the price now.
Tuesday, December 26, 2023 Report this