Spring ISD Meets State Standards, One School Needs Improvement

SPRING, TX — All but one of the campuses in Spring ISD met the state's standards, according to accountability ratings recently released by the Texas Education Agency.

Although the overall district met state standards, seven of the district's campuses missed one of the state's marks in at least one category and another school is one the list of low performing schools.

The annual ratings are designed to provide a snapshot of a school's performance, but the system has come under fire for relying on scores from the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR, exams — the latest model of Texas' high-stakes standardized tests.

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Given the problems that plagued this year's tests — glitches in online tests, testing materials being sent to other schools and in one case to a church, scores being attributed to the wrong schools, flimsy answer sheets — it's a stretch to think that this year's fill-in-the-blank could be used to measure anything other than how much money the state saved by switching vendors.

Expect legislation to change the ratings game to be introduced when the filing period opens at the end of the year. Given how much time is guaranteed to be devoted to the three "G's" of Texas state politics — gays, guns and God — whether or not education bills will get a hearing when the Lege gets back next year is a bit of a crap shoot.

The campus that wound up on the low performing schools list is Ralph Eickenroht Elementary. Eickenroht dropped the ball in student achievement, getting 55 of the needed 60, and barely missed closing the performance gaps — needed 28, got 27.

The school put two in the W column by getting 42 in student progress, needed 32, and 16 in postsecondary readiness, needed 12.

Six of the seven campuses — Andy Dekaney High School, Bammel Middle School, Bammel Elementary, Clark Intermediate, Hoyland Elementary and Helen Major Elementary — all missed the mark in student achievement. Carl Wunsche Sr. High School fumbled on student progress.

However, given the shortcomings of this year's tests perhaps all the schools should get a round of applause for even getting in the end zone, what with the goal line constantly shifting.