Schools
El Cerrito, Kensington Schools Rank From Highest to Lowest in State Tests
Madera and Kensington ranked in the highest of local schools, while Portola and El Cerrito were among the lowest in test data released Thursday.
El Cerrito and Kensington schools run the gamut in comparison with schools statewide in rankings released Thursday.
Schools are given two rankings ranging from 1 to 10, with 10 being the highest. One ranking shows the comparison with other schools in the state, and the second features a comparison with schools with similar demographics.
Madera Elementary School ranked 10 both in its statewide ranking and its similar-schools ranking (Madera's API report), while Kensington Elementary ranked 10 statewide and 9 in the similar-schools ranking (Kensington's API report).
Find out what's happening in El Cerritowith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Harding Elementary ranked 5 statewide and 6 in the similar-schools ranking (Harding report), while Fairmont Elementary ranked 4 statewide and 5 in comparison to similar schools (Fairmont report).
Portola Middle and El Cerrito High both ranked 2 in statewide comparison and 1 against similar schools (Portola report, El Cerrito report).
Find out what's happening in El Cerritowith free, real-time updates from Patch.
The newly released rankings are based on the three-digit API scores released in September, which in turn are based on student performance on standardized tests. The API data released earlier showed and a small drop at Kensington Elementary.
A statement by the California Department of Education about the school rankings said:
"A school's statewide rank is based on the school's Base API and is calculated separately for three types of schools: elementary, middle, and high schools. Ranks are established by deciles. Each decile contains 10 percent of all schools of each type.
"It is important to note that there will always be schools ranked 1 and schools ranked 10 because of the nature of the decile system. Ten percent of schools will always be in each decile.
"The similar schools rank is similar to the statewide rank, except that each school is ranked relative to a group of 100 schools determined to be similar to the comparison school based on certain school, student, and teacher characteristics.”
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said in a statement that the reports also give each school “a number of points by which they must grow in order to satisfy the requirements of our state accountability system."
Reports for other schools can be found here: http://www.cde.ca.gov/ta/ac/ap/apireports.asp.
