Written by: Seth Gordon, Newberg Graphic 

Newberg School District has put considerable time and energy into improving instruction for secondary students

In an effort to improve outcomes for students of all kinds and boost its graduation rate, the Newberg School District has put considerable time and energy into improving instruction for secondary students.

According to district officials who came before the school board, graduation data from the past five years and from neighboring districts in 2016 supports that approach.

Director of Assessment Don Staples and communications director Claudia made separate presentations at the Feb. 21 meeting, looking at different data, but combined said the information does paint a picture of the challenges the district faces.

Staples, who was on a lengthy medical leave to fight cancer at the time of the presentation and died in his home a week later, examined Newberg cohort graduation data from 2011 to 2016, with an emphasis on how several sub groups in the class of 2016 achieved.

He noted that in digging deeply into the class of 2015 graduation data a year earlier, the district discovered that students that enroll in the district for the first time after ninth grade, which is mostly transfers, were graduating at a low rate.

In 2016, that rate was 43 percent. Staples also noted that in the class of 2016, 95 percent of those students who completed ninth grade with 8.0 credits went on to graduate, while that figure dropped to 82.5 percent for 6.5 to 7.5 credits and to 26 percent for 6 or less credits.

In response, the district has put an emphasis on helping incoming ninth-grade students to make the transition to high school in hopes that fewer would fall short of 8.0 credits.

"So we started the process and what this year's numbers tell us is that was the right choice because the percentage was actually even a little lower than last year," Staples said. "These things take time to move, but we are confident we're doing the right things."

Staples also presented information on the three academic indicators — proficiency in reading at third grade and in math at both fifth and eighth grade — and that district administrators have focused on improving as part of their School Improvement Plans (SIP).

According to Staples, 92 percent of students from the class of 2016 who met all three indicators earned a diploma, 4 percent stayed in school for a fifth year, under 2 percent earned a GED and 3 percent were non-completers and did not earn any form of diploma.

If students did not meet one indicator, 86 percent went on to earn a diploma and 5 percent were "non-completers."

Staples also pointed out that while Newberg certainly needs to improve the four-year graduation rate for certain subgroups — such as economically disadvantaged (under 70 percent), English Language learners (under 60) and limited English proficient (40 percent) — he did give the board a positive take.

"It doesn't really matter their background or what group they fit in, if they hit those marks, they're really likely to graduate."

Staples also looked at attendance in ninth grade and found those who had an attendance rate of 90 percent or higher graduated at 84 percent in 2016, but that figure fell to 47 percent for those with a rate below 90. Drilling down further into the data, Staples reported that the median ninth-grade attendance rate for those earning a diploma was 97.1, while the median for those not earning one was 92.2 percent.

Stewart presented the board with information about how Newberg compared to other districts in many of the same categories and found that while Newberg does well and is on par or above neighboring towns and Oregon Department of Education-indicated "like schools" in hitting the elementary indicators, the district often falls behind when it comes to graduation rate.

"At the secondary level, that's where the challenges are," Stewart said. "That's not a surprise to (superintendent) Kym (LeBlanc-Esparza) or principals because that's where they've been focused. This is from the 5,000-foot level."

Among several neighboring and "like schools," Stewart found Newberg most comparable to Canby and McMinn­ville in terms of student demographics.

Newberg was on par or slightly better than McMinn­ville in several of the indicators, including third grade reading (63 percent), fifth-grade math (52), and ahead of Canby and other comparable schools on those measures, but lagged behind in some secondary measures and graduation rate.

For instance, 84 percent of Newberg students were on track to graduate after ninth grade compared to 89 for Canby and 91 for McMinnville. Canby and McMinnville also had graduation rates of 90 and 87 percent in 2016 compared to 79 for Newberg, which was a significant increase from 2015.

Diving deeper, Newberg also lagged behind its peers on many of the secondary indicators when it came to economically disadvantaged students.

"We certainly wish it would go faster, but it was a year when we felt like we were working on the right things," Staples said. "We're going to get there. We just don't know how fast."