Students will spend the next two weeks trying their best to show what they know on the
“There’s a lot riding on it,” said Patti Fowler, principal at Oscar Patterson Elementary. “The reputation of the school, retentions, promotions, monetary bonuses for the staff if we can raise the grade.”
Patterson Elementary is the school district’s only “F” school. The school is striving to leave this testing period with scores high enough to move the school up to a C, Fowler said.
“No one likes to have a grade of an F,” Fowler said. “The children don’t like it and the staff don’t care for it. We need to get rid of that so that we can attract more children to come to Patterson.”
Compared to state averages that showed 53 percent of schools dropped by one letter grade and 29 percent of schools earned an A, Bay performed a little better than the majority of other districts. However, 63 percent was the highest percentage of students at any grade level to pass the reading portion of the FCAT.
To improve reading skills, an extra hour of reading was added to the school day at Patterson and
Patterson also offered Saturday school for the past two weeks; 45 percent of testing students attended.
“We feel that with all the extra effort that we’ve put into our teaching this year, that we will see a difference with the children on our scores and we will be able to move our grade up,” Fowler added.
Camilla Hudson, assessment and accountability coordinator at Bay District Schools, noted the district’s biggest focus this year was on writing.
“Every year when FCAT scores are released … we find our areas of strength and weaknesses,” she said.
Districtwide, attendance was normal Monday and no major conflicts surfaced during testing, she said.
“I will consider it a very successful day of testing,”