When the official state report card was released on Tuesday, August 15, 2006, the Akron Public Schools received a Continuous Improvement rating for the second consecutive year.

"Teachers, students, families and this community should be very proud of the strides this district made," said Board President Rev. Dr. Curtis T. Walker, Sr.

"We stayed the course by focusing on raising academic standards, adapting the way we teach and working with each child individually," said Superintendent Sylvester Small. "The proof of our hard work is improved test scores over the past year."

The district achieved the Continuous Improvement status by:

• Earning Performance Index score above 80, up 25 percent over the past three years; and,
• Increasing the Performance Index score by 10 points over two years.

The Performance Index score measures a student's achievement and shows trends over time. It is a weighted average of all tested subjects.

"A Performance Index score of 90 or higher earns a school district an Effective rating," said Small. "We were 4.2 points away, and we will work hard this year to move closer to that goal."

Other highlights of this year's report card for the Akron Public Schools include:

• Akron Public Schools met 7 of 25 indicators, up from three last year.
• More students are testing at higher levels. Since 2003-04, the number of students testing at accelerated and above increased 165 percent, while 25 percent fewer students are testing below proficient.
• Over the past year, test score rates of improvement have risen dramatically including:

1. Reading:
District – up 31%
Grade 6 – up 45%

2. Writing:
District - up 22%
Grade 4 - up 15%

Grade 10 - up 7%

3. Math: Test scores are up across the district and in every grade tested.
District - up 76%
Grade 3 - up 10%
Grade 4 - up 23%
Grade 6 - up 13%
Grade 7 - up 2%
Grade 8 - up 23%
Grade 10 - up 3%

• The graduation rate increased to 80.3 percent.
• Attendance is at 93.4 percent.
• Three schools received a rating of Excellent (Ellet, Firestone, Miller South).
• Sixteen schools received a rating of Effective, up from nine the year before.
• Twenty-seven schools received a rating of Continuous Improvement.
• 81% of Akron's schools rated Continuous Improvement or higher.
• No Akron public school has an Academic Emergency rating.

"We feel good about our progress," said Dr. Small. "We nearly doubled the number of our schools rated Effective during the 2005-06 school year.  Reading scores are up. Writing scores are up. Math scores are up. We look forward to building on that success during the 2006-07 school year."