The Level 4 List: Jeremiah E Burke and The English High Schools (Boston)

JEREMIAH E BURKE

The Jeremiah E Burke High School in Boston, which serves approximately 635 students in grades 9 through 12, was named to the state's Level 4 school list in January 2010. Burke's student population is nearly two-thirds African American/Black; the low income population has ranged from 63.3 to 76% since 2007-08 while the Limited English proficiency population is about a quarter of the population. In 2011-12, 38.7% of students spoke English as a second language and 20.4% were special education students (Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education).

On the 2009 MCAS exam, 31% of 10th students overall were proficient or advanced in English Language Arts (ELA) and 41% were proficient or better in math. At the subgroup level that year, 55% of Hispanic/Latino students were proficient in ELA while just 24% of African American/Black students were proficient. Additionally, before Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) was phased out  due to the No Child Left Behind waiver granted to Massachusetts in 2012, Burke had not met AYP at the subgroup level in ELA from 2006 through 2011 and in math from 2007 through 2011. In 2008-09 students missed an average of 22.7 days of school and the attendance rate was 83.8%. The dropout rate that year was 21.1% and had been above 10% every year since 2002-03.

Since being designated a Level 4 school, proficiency rates on the MCAS exams at Burke have improved in both ELA and math. Below are the percentage of students who were proficient or better on each section of the exam from 2009 - 2012.

	2009	2010	2011	2012
ELA	31%	29%	41%	50%
Math	41%	28%	39%	50%

In 2012, the percentage of students in ELA receiving a 'Warning/Failing' grade decreased 11 percentage points while the percentage of students receiving a score in this range in math decreased 8 percentage points. Further:

• The percentage of students 'Advanced' in ELA increased 4 percentage points from 1% in 2011 to 5% in 2012.
• The percentage of students with an 'Advanced' score in math doubled from the previous year.
• Just 2% of male students received a 'Warning/Failing' score in ELA
• No student with a disability received a 'Warning/Failing' score in ELA with 90% scoring in the 'Needs Improvement' range
• The percentage of Low Income students proficient or better in math increased 14 points from 2011 to 2012

In terms of its Cumulative Progress and Performance Index (CPPI), Burke met its state-mandated goals at the aggregate level and for the African American/Black subgroup this year but missed other targets including that for Low Income students and High Needs students. In regard to the CPI, which is a score given to assess a subgroup, school or district's progress toward 100% proficiency, Burke had an overall score of 80.4 in ELA and 76.1 in math both of which were above the target range for the school; scores range from 0 - 100 with 100 denoting that all students are proficient.

The attendance and dropout rates at Burke have improved over the last few years (data for 2011-12 is not yet available). Out of school suspensions were down 5.3 points in 2011-12 from 2010-11 to 0.9%.

	08-09	09-10	10-11	11-12
Dropout Rate	13.9%	14.5%	12.6%	N/A
Attendance Rate	84.1%	86.9%	88.2%	91.1%

In 2012, the school was in the 5th percentile relative to schools serving common grades.



THE ENGLISH HIGH

The English High School in Boston, which serves approximately 750 students also in grades 9 through 12, was named to the state's Level 4 school list in 2010 along with Burke. English's student population is just over half Hispanic/Latino and a third African American/Black; the low income population has been about three-quarters of the population since 2005-06 while the Limited English proficiency population has ranged between 22.7 and 38.1%. In 2011-12, 50% of students spoke English as a second language and 23.5% were special education students (Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education).

On the 2009 MCAS exam, 40% of students overall were proficient or advanced in English Language Arts (ELA) while 38% were proficient or better in math. That year only 1% of the population was 'Advanced' in ELA; from 2004 through 2009, the percentage of students 'Advanced' in ELA ranged from 0 - 1%. Before Adequate Yearly Progress was phased out, English had not made AYP at the subgroup levels in ELA and math from 2004 to 2011. Additionally, in 2008-09 students missed an average of 17.6 days of school and the attendance rate was 87.7%. The dropout rate that year was 5.4%.

Since being designated a Level 4 school, proficiency rates on the MCAS exams at English improved from 2010 to 2011 only to decline in 2012. Below are the percentage of students who were proficient or better on each section of the exam from 2009 - 2012.

	2009	2010	2011	2012
ELA	40%	40%	45%	39%
Math	38%	38%	45%	31%

In 2012, the percentage of students in ELA receiving a 'Warning/Failing' grade decreased 4 percentage points while the percentage of students receiving a score in this range in math also increased 12 percentage points from 2011. Further:

• In 2012, the percentage of students 'Advanced' in ELA declined 5 percentage from 2011 to 0% of the overall population while the percentage of students 'Advanced' in math decreased by half to 9% of the population.
• The percentage of students 'Proficient' in math has increased 6 percentage points from 2009.
• Males and females were evenly matched in the percentage falling into 'Warning/Failing' category in math (39% vs. 38%).
• The percentage of students in 2008 who were 'Advanced' or 'Proficient' in science was 3%; this number was 23% in 2012. 
• The graduation rate in 2011 was 50.3% compared to 64.4% for the Boston Public School district as a whole.

In terms of its Cumulative Progress and Performance Index (CPPI), English met its goal at the African American subgroup level but did not meet any of the other targets this year. In regard to the CPI, English has an overall score of 77.1 in ELA and 62.8 in math.

The dropout rate has remained nearly the same while the attendance rate has decreased since 2008-09.

	08-09	09-10	10-11	11-12
Dropout Rate	5.4%	5.5%	5.7%	N/A
Attendance Rate	87.7%	86.8%	87.6%	83.4%

In 2012, the school was in the 5th percentile relative to schools serving common grades.

If both schools meet all of the requirements, Burke and English could exit Level 4 status at the end of the 2012-13 school year.


Citation: www.doe.mass.edu 


You may also be interested in:

• The Level 4 List: Charlotte M. Murkland Elementary School (Lowell) 
• The Level 4 List: Henry Lord Middle School (Fall River) 
• The Level 4 List: EJ Harrington and Wm Connery Elementary Schools (Lynn)

A Look at Boston's Special Education Population

Next in the series regarding the special education populations Massachusetts' ten urban districts, we'll look at Boston. In the Boston public school system, special education students currently make up 18.7% of the student population; BPS has an enrollment of 55,414 with 10,373 students identified as 'special education.'

Demographics

Below is how the special ed population breaks down in terms of demographics.

Asian	3.7%
Black/African American	40.5%
Hispanic	42.1%
Multiracial	1.7%
Native American	0.3%
White	11.4%

Female	33%
Male	67%

Low Income	74.2%
Limited English Proficiency	29.5%
First Lang. Not English	36.6%

The disabilities with the highest student counts in Boston are:

• Specific Learning Disability (3,370)
• Communication (1,839)
• Emotional (1,222)
• Intellectual (1,172)
• Developmental Delay (1,172)

The age with the highest student count is 11 (788 students) followed by 10 (782).

MCAS

Special ed students in Boston, a Level 4 district, were among the subgroups not making Adequate Yearly Progress at all grade levels in 2011 similar to the Lynn, Worcester and Fall River public school districts. In 2011, students with disabilities had a 15% proficiency rate in English language arts  (ELA) exam and a 12% proficiency rate in math. The Composite Performance Indices (CPI) for special education students has increased 2.1 points in ELA and  3.3 points in math since 2009. CPIs are a measure of the extent to which students are progressing toward proficiency in ELA and math; the goal is a CPI of 100.  More specifically, each student participating in the MCAS is given a score based on well they perform on the exam which is later averaged to determine the school or subgroup's CPI; possible scores are 0 (Warning/Failing - Low), 25 (Warning/Failing - High), 50 (Needs Improvement - Low), 75 (Needs Improvement - High), and 100 (Proficient or Advanced). In 2011, the ELA CPI for students with disabilities was 57.3 while the math CPI was 49.3.

Educational Outcomes

In terms of educational outcomes, special education students in Boston tend to graduate at a much lower rate than 'general education' students. This is much in line with state trends as well as the trend seen in both Lynn and Worcester as well as in Fall River. See below for the graduation rates from 2006 - 2010.

	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010
Special Ed	36.2%	35.8%	36.9%	41%	40.9%
General Ed	64.6%	63.3%	65.4%	66.4%	68.7%
All Students	59.1%	57.9%	59.9%	61.4%	63.2%

The graduation rate for this population in Boston decreased slightly to 40.8% in 2011 for the district as a whole. Nearly 32% of special education students were still in school after four years in 2011 while 25.3% dropped out. The five year graduation rate for special education students in Boston was 48.6% in 2010 with 17% still in school.

Special ed students in Boston also, for the most part, tend to dropout at a higher rate than the general ed population. Below is the annual dropout rate for the years 2006 - 2010.

	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010
Special Ed	12.3%	11.2%	9.4%	9.6%	5.5%
General Ed	9.4%	8.5%	7.2%	6.4%	7.1%
All Students	9.9%	8.9%	7.6%	7%	6.8%

One can see here that although the trend is for a higher percentage of special education students to drop out than general education students, in 2010 the opposite was true with a slightly higher percentage of general ed students leaving school compared to special ed students. The four year dropout rate for special ed students was however over 10 percentage points higher than the district rate as a whole in 2011 as 15.1% of all students dropped out of school compared to 25.3% of special ed students. On a positive note, the four year dropout rate for special ed students is down four percentage points from 2006. 

In 2009-10, a little more than half of the special ed students were going to attend a college or university with 57.1% of this group attending a Massachusetts community college; 27.5% of college going special ed students planned to attend a private four year college/university. That year 193 special ed students were reported to have taken the SAT with average scores of 348 in Reading, 337 in Writing, and 346 in Math. In terms of Advanced Placement participation and performance, 44 test takers took 59 tests in 2010 with 32.2% scoring a 3 or better on a 5-point scale on all subjects combined.

*All Data Taken from: http://www.doe.mass.edu/