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Illinois State Board of Education 2005 School Report Card release features new parent-friendly Illinois School Profile

Board provides accurate, on-time Report Cards to schools and districts

Statewide results show continued improvement with ongoing
need to address achievement gap

Springfield, IL—The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) has released the 2005 State, School and District Report Cards. This year’s Report Card release includes a new parent-friendly Illinois School Profile for each school to make it easier for parents to quickly get information about how their children’s schools are performing. In 2004 Governor Rod Blagojevich asked the new State Board to work with key parent and educator groups to develop a more parent-friendly way to communicate the most important information from the School Report Cards.

“When parents send their children off to school each day, they want to know if those schools are providing their sons and daughters with a good education,” said Gov. Blagojevich. “We have created the new Illinois School Profile to make it simple for parents to find out how their child’s school compares with state averages on class size, academic performance and other education indicators.”

ISBE sought input from educators and parents throughout the State and worked with the Illinois Parent Teacher Association (PTA) to create the customized Illinois School Profile for each Illinois school, focusing on key information for each school including attendance and graduation rates, composite student test scores, composite teacher information including education level and average salaries, school district finances, Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), school news, and parent and family involvement.

"We thank the Illinois PTA and parents and educators around the state for their help and input in developing the Illinois School Profile. By working together we were able to create an effective new communication tool to help parents understand their school’s annual results,” said Randy Dunn, State Superintendent. “In addition to creating the new Illinois School Profile, our Agency staff worked closely with schools and districts throughout the State to make sure that this year’s Report Cards were out on time and error-free. This information receives a great deal of attention from parents and communities and making sure the information is correct was a top priority for the Agency and for local school districts.”

The Federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) requires states to issue School and District Report Cards each year, including many demographic, data and assessment details about each school and district. called on them to address the state’s chronic Report Card mess. Historically Illinois School and District Report Cards were issued to schools months past the statutory deadline and were riddled with data errors.

2005 Report Card Results

The 2005 Report Cards show statewide student assessment results continue to improve, demonstrating good progress in several areas while there is a continued need for work to narrow the achievement gap between student groups.

Analysis of the Illinois State Achievement Test (ISAT) shows improvements including:

• third grade student Reading scores increased or held steady across all student groups;
• fourth grade students showed marked gains in Science across all student groups;
• fifth grade Math scores were up across all student groups; and
• eighth grade Reading scores increased significantly over all student groups.

In addition, analysis of the Prairie State Achievement Examination (PSAE) results showed significant gains in Reading among Hispanic, Black and Low Income students.

Dropout rate continues to decline

Information included in this year’s School Report Card also indicates that state’s school dropout has continued to decline, a trend that began in 1996. In 1996, the dropout rate was 6.5 percent. In 2005, the dropout rate has declined to 4 percent. Dropouts include students in grades 9-12 whose names have been removed from the district roster for any reason other than death, extended illness, graduation/completion of a program of studies, transfer to another school or expulsion.

The mobility rate has also continued to decline. In 1996 it stood at 18.8 percent and for 2005 it has fallen to 16.1 percent. The mobility rate is the sum of the students transferred out of a school and students transferred in, divided by the average daily enrollment, multiplied by 100.

To access the School, District and State Report Cards or view any Illinois School Profile go to www.isbe.net and click on the Report Card link on the left.