EDMONTON — The Fraser Institute’s annual report card on Alberta elementary schools is in.
This year’s report highlights 52 Alberta elementary schools that have shown “significant improvement in their academic performance over the past five years.” Six of the top 10 fasting-improving schools, according to the Fraser Institute, are in Edmonton. Of the top 10, one is located in Calgary.
The ‘Report Card on Alberta’s Elementary Schools 2015,’ lists Belvedere, Sweet Grass, John A. McDougall, Hazeldean, Grandin and Greenview schools in its top 10 fastest-improving schools. The number one spot in the category goes to Duchess Public School.
The Fraser Institute made specific note to Hazeldean school, which sits in eighth place, for showing “marked improvement.”
“Despite over 50 per cent of its Grade 6 class having special needs, Hazeldean students earned a score of 5.9 in 2014 – more than double its rating five years ago,” a media release read.
“It doesn’t matter where a school is located or what obstacles its students face, the results consistently show that improvement is possible,” said Peter Cowley, Fraser Institute’s director of school performance studies.
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The president of the Alberta Teacher’s Association says the Fraser Institute’s report represents a “major misuse” of the marks produced by provincial achievement tests.
“It speaks to everything that’s wrong with the use of the data,” said Mark Ramsankar.
“(It’s) a single one-off view of where children stand throughout the course of a year on a curriculum that’s not fully represented in a one-off exam. And then proclaiming that you can rank and draw sweeping conclusions from this data, it’s misinformed, it’s misinforming Albertans and it’s the reason we don’t believe in standardized tests in this form for Alberta children.”
The annual report card ranks 813 public, separate, francophone, private and charter schools based on seven academic indicators derived from province-wide test results.
Read the entire 2015 report below.
Fraser Institute’s Report Card on Alberta’s Elementary Schools 2015
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