ECISD gets low scores

Six schools making the Texas Education Agency’s list of Public Education Grant program schools wasn’t really news for the Ector County Independent School District.

 Bonham, Bowie, Crockett and Hood are on the list for scoring less than 50 percent on science TAKS, according to ECISD communications director Mike Adkins. He said OHS and Permian are on this year’s PEG list due to the low graduation rate

“Obviously we’re not happy about it, but this is nothing new. It doesn’t change how we do our daily business. We knew about these problems and have been working on them and will continue to work to improve,” Adkins said. ECISD administrators were not available for comment Wednesday afternoon.

Bonham, Bowie, Crockett and Hood were on the PEG list in 2007, for the 2008-’09 academic year. Bowie and Hood also appeared on the PEG list in 2008 for the 2009-’10 school year.

A PEG school is determined through testing data submitted annually by Texas public schools. Schools are put on the list if 50 percent or more of the student population fails to pass any part of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills in two of the past three years. Schools may also be put on the list if rated Academically Unacceptable in 2007, 2008 or 2009 under the statewide accountability system.

Schools are removed from the list if they rise above Academically Unacceptable status or score higher than 50 percent on TAKS tests for two out of three years.

The PEG program came into effect in 1995 as a way to provide students in low performing schools with a way out by offering transfers to better performing schools.

The program hasn’t been as effective as originally hoped, TEA communications director Debbie Ratcliffe said. Though students may transfer to a non-PEG school, districts are not required to provide the student with transportation to the school.

When students transfer outside their district, the receiving school gets a 10 percent increase in per capita funding for the transfer student, Ratcliffe said. However, many potential transfer schools are too full to take the students.

There is no increase in state funding for a student who transfers within the district, said Belinda Dyer, TEA’s director of forecasting and fiscal analysis.

“The first couple of years we received hundreds of calls from interested parents but now only a couple hundred students take advantage of the program,” Ratcliffe said of statewide trends. PEG has to be altered by the state legislature, which is out of session until next year.

The TEA is required by law to publish the list every year. They publish in December so schools have time to notify parents by Feb. 1, as is required by law.

ECISD letters are scheduled to go out in the middle of January. Parents who wish to apply must do so by June.

Adkins said less than 50 students took advantage of the PEG program and transferred last year.

Jonathan Delgado from the TEA division of performance reporting said that 283 students were enrolled as PEG-transfer students last fall.

 This year there are only two non-PEG junior high schools for students to transfer to in the district. The district will schedule a lottery determining which PEG-transfer students go to Ector or Nimitz in the 2010-’11 school year.

There are no non-PEG high schools for students to transfer to within ECISD.

The federal No Child Left Behind program adopted PEG but added a transportation requirement.  This program has had a much higher participation rate, Ratcliffe said.

“It’s another way to highlight schools that are struggling and keeps pressure on the schools to improve, but the carrot works better than the stick. Most school administrators, if they’re on this list, they want to improve and are working hard to do so,” Ratcliffe said.