From the article "Last summer, Law told the school board that Hinsdale South had failed to meet adequate yearly progress (AYP) standards established by the No Child Left Behind Act for the 2009-10 school year because less than 77.5 percent of students did not meet or exceed state standards in three sub-groups: Blacks, Hispanics, and Students With Disabilities. However, the district's overall score of 78 percent is still well above the state average."

Misleading! Hinsdale South did not make AYP in Reading in the White subgroup @ 73.3% in Math it was 75.4. For all Hinsdale South the Percent Meeting/Exceeding Standards for 2010 was 67.9 for Reading (Meet AYP=No) and Math 70.7 (Meet AYP=No) according to data from the district Web site. http://hinsdale86.org/about/reportcard/Documents/South%20Report%20Card%202010.pdf

Why is the District covering up for the failure of the Hinsdale South administration to meet AYP? Was this an innocent mistake or calculated to deceive? What do you say Mr. Jacobs?

John Regan

Thank you for your comment Mr. Regan.
I'm afraid I can't speak to the motives of other people. Nor would I want to put words in other people's mouths that misrepresent what they were trying to say, so perhaps in pursuit of brevity, my wording for what Mr. Law reported was not as clear as it could have been.
You are correct that the White subgroup also failed to achieve AYP, but I believe what was trying to be communicated was that the figures for the other subgroups mentioned were particularly discouraging. Specifically, only 28.1 percent of Blacks, 35.4 percent of low-income students, and 16 percent of students with disabilities met the reading standards (all substantially lower percentages than the previous year) and only 33.3 percent of Blacks, 33.8 percent of low-income, and 16 percent of students with disabilities met the math standards (the numbers for Blacks and low-income students did not change appreciably from the previous year, but the percentage of students with disabilities meeting the standard was down significantly).
As the story notes, Mr. Kumis did question Mr. Law about the drop off in meeting standards. Mr. Law then observed that the standards increase each year. This past year, the target was 77.5 percent meeting or exceeding, up from 70 percent the previous year. Had the standard remained at 70 percent, South would have met the goal in math, but still would have fallen short in reading.

By leaving the white subgroup off the list of Hinsdale South subgroups failing to make AYP, the common misconception, supported by the District's own surveys, is being fed, that the problem at South is not widespread, but limited to certain subgroups. At only 68-71% of students meeting or exceeding standards, many South students have not excelled academically. At 85-88%, many more Central students have excelled academically, as measured by PSAE results. The white subgroup was left off the South AYP subgroup failure list even though it comprises 65% of the South student body. The white subgroup's results for 2010 at South of 73-75% is well below the white subgroup's results at Central of 89-90%.

It is SOUTH, NOT the DISTRICT, which failed to make the AYP in the No Child Left Behind Act. The district avg of 78% is a combination of Central's at 85-88% and South's 65-71%. I believe a more accurate title would read "Central Students Continue to Excel Academically and the Gap from South Students Widened as measured by PSAE results for 2010 versus 2009". With the sub heading "South went from 6-10 % points OVER the State AYP Minimum Target in 2009 to 7-10% points UNDER Target in 2010".

What can be done to close the gap over time? Why hasn't there been a change in leadership at South given the discouraging PSAE results? According to Dr. Wahl “South must offer its parents the option of transferring their students to another school that is making AYP in the district (Central) with transportation provided by the district.” What would happen to the District’s capital budget if Central's enrollment continues to increase and South’s continues to decrease? When will the 1% of federal funds be cut from the district budget to eliminate the option of transferring students?

Thank you for your headline suggestions Mr. Regan.
My job as a reporter, in this particular instance, was to attend a school board meeting and report on what transpired. AYP was not even discussed at this meeting and the data presented was for the district as a whole and not broken down by school.
Academic achievement can be measured in a variety of ways, and Mr. Law presented several at the meeting, including ACT and AP exam results, which show district students performing well overall.
With respect to the PSAE results, the percentage of South students "meeting or exceeding" state standards is still well above the state average, represented by the black line on the graph. More specifically, 67.8 percent of South students met the reading standards, compared with a state average of 54 percent. For math, 70.6 percent of South students met the standard, compared with 52.7 percent statewide.
Whether South's results are "adequate" for a District 86 school is a matter for district residents to decide, not me.

If I was a reporter I would want to question the district's assertion that district students continue to excel academically. When one of the two high schools in the district has failed the AYP test, then the assertion merits further scrutiny. When did 68% meeting or exceed MINIMUM STATE standards become acceptable?

On the other hand, a reporter can use his megaphone to amplify the self promoting spin coming from the district administration.

Its up to you.

As a taxpaying disrict resident I would be inclined to support any board member or prospective board member intent on adressing the lack of progress at Hinsdale South because it has become apparent the district administration won't address it.

Certainly, everyone would like to see every district student achieving academic success. Obviously, not every student is. However, the statistics presented at the board meeting indicate that students in the district AS A WHOLE are performing very well academically.
Many of the statistics you cite relative to South's performance specifically were presented at an earlier board meeting and reported by Patch.
Thank you for your comments Mr. Regan. I appreciate your interest in this topic.

I am relatively new to The Patch and in following local news. My interest was peaked by this article and the thread, so I decided to review the 2010 South Report Card. Was there some huge event that took place last year at the school that is related to the 15% decrease of female graduates from 2009 to 2010? And the less than 50% graduation rate for multiethnic students? If so, can you please provide me a link to the story?

If there has been no previous discussion, I would love to hear what our district candidates plan on doing about the issue, especially with the election coming so soon. Are you aware of any debates in the area next week that ALL candidates will be at? I attended one last week where only one slate was able to be present.

It appears that the school board is not interested in the plight of Hinsdale South. I would wager none of the candidates are either. I can't understand why more parents and taxpayers haven't expressed enough concern to put it on their radar.

Hi Cynthia and welcome to Patch!
I'm not aware of any more candidate forums. It's unfortunate that all of the candidates could not be present at either forum. However, four of the six (two from each slate) did attend the first forum and here's a link to a series of videos in which the candidates responded to various questions from the audience:
http://darien-il.patch.com/articles/video-candidates-speak-out-at-district-86-forum
Also, if you click on the Elections 2011 tab at the top of the Darien homepage, you can scroll through and find a number of stories related to the upcoming school board election and the other elections that will be contested on April 5.
With respect to your questions on Hinsdale South's 2010 Report Card, I'm afraid I don't have the answers. The question on the female graduation rate is a good one. From a statistical standpoint, the multi-ethnic pool is very small (about 47 students), so even a drop of a few students failing to graduate could produce a large percentage decline.
I haven't found a link to a specific article that would answer these questions, but some aspects of the report card (like AYP in this story) have cropped up in various articles. You could type in Hinsdale South or District 86 in the search box at the top of the page to find some of these.