Schools

Schools Receive Report Cards From the State

Links for Absegami and Galloway Township schools were released last week.

It’s the time of year when the taxpayers across the state of New Jersey can see how the schools in their district rate in a multitude of areas.

The New Jersey School Report Cards, which grades the school districts across the state in 35 different areas, for the 2010-11 school year were released last week. Some of the categories in which the schools are judged are school environment, student information, school performance indicators, staff information and district finances.

Schools in the Galloway Township School District and the Greater Egg Harbor Regional School District were graded. Highlights include:

Find out what's happening in Gallowaywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

  • According to High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA) testing in Language Arts, 75.8 percent students were proficient, up 5 percent from last year, while 17.2 percent were advanced, down from 18.9 percent last year.
  • In Mathematics, Absegami students were 59.9 percent proficient, up nearly eight full percentage points from last year, while 18.3 percent were advanced, down from 21.8 percent last year.
  • More Absegami students took the SATs this year, as 359 students, making up 72 percent of the school’s population took the test. In 2009-10, 336 students (64 percent) took the test, and in 2008-09, 306 students (63 percent) took the test. However, the average score was the lowest in three years, at 498. In 2009-10, it was 511, and in 2008-09, it was 518.
  • The median salary for administrators in the Galloway Township School District is $109,797, up from $107,641 last year, but below the state average of $111,133.
  • The median salary for faculty in the Galloway Township School District is $57,245, up from $54,645 last year, but below the state average of $59,575.
  • The Galloway Township School District spends $16,130 per pupil, down from $17,032 last year.
  • Language is the dominant language in the high school and across the K-8 district, with between 70 and 86 percent of students in each school speaking English. Spanish is second across the district, with 10 percent of students speaking the language.
  • Attendance rate in the high school was 93.3 percent, up from 92.5 percent from last year. Dropout rates are highest among white males, with 1.2 percent of white people dropping out, and 1.2 percent of males dropping out.

New school performance reports for every school in the state will be developed next year, the New Jersey Department of Education announced last week. The new reports will take the place of separate school report cards and No Child Left Behind (NCLB) reports.

"The Department will set specific school and subgroup performance targets for both language arts and math, and will report annual progress towards meeting those goals," the DOE said in a news release.

Find out what's happening in Gallowaywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"In addition, the reports will include a number of new data points including progress towards closing achievement gaps, comparison to 'peer schools' with similar demographics, growth as measured through Student Growth Percentiles on state tests over time, and additional college and career readiness data points. These public reports will help districts and schools to engage in local performance management by setting local performance goals, identifying strengths and weaknesses, and developing local plans to focus on areas of low performances in their districts."

Report cards for each school are available at the following links:


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