Gov. Glenn Youngkin rolled out a new website, called the Road to Readiness, that aims to provide the community with easily accessible information on school performance in Virginia.
This new site provides students, family members, and the community with access to data on schools’ performance metrics and support resources that are available to them. It’s part of the new School Performance & Support Framework, part of Youngkin’s work to overhaul how Virginia measures school success.
Under the new system, schools are ranked in four categories: Distinguished, On Track, Off Track, or Needs Intensive Support. It uses factors such as success rates and improvement on the Standards of Learning test, chronic absenteeism, and on-time graduation rates to determine the rankings.
Youngkin also announced that his 2025 budget proposal will include at least an additional $50 million for support “for getting Virginia’s public schools most in need back on track,” according to a news release.
“This new Road to Readiness embodies our commitment to high expectations, transparency, and prioritizing resources to those students and schools most in need,” said Youngkin. “Our School Performance Framework and this new resource hub reaffirm our commitment to empowering our teachers, partnering with our parents, strengthening our schools and most importantly, preparing every student for success.”
The current data on the site show 19 percent of all schools (including elementary, middle, and high schools) ranking as Distinguished, 55 percent On Track, 21 percent Off Track, and 5 percent as Needs Intensive Support.
Schools that receive a Distinguished rank will be encouraged to share their strategies for success, while schools in need of more support “will be clearly identified to better receive targeted support and the guidance to meaningfully improve,” a news release from the Virginia Department of Education said.
“We must use the data from this framework as a tool to inform, empower, and improve,” said Secretary of Education Aimee Guidera. “When teachers, families and students have actionable information along with proven roadmaps and resources to support their improvement efforts, achievement increases.”
To see how schools in NoVA did, click on the Virginia Department of Education’s hub and scroll down to the yellow banner, School Data and Cumulative Score.
Feature image, stock.adobe.com
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