First quarter has come to a close and it’s time to look at the facts that will serve as our baseline data for the year. Staff and students arrive at school on a daily basis to teach and learn. Measuring the outcome of our daily work allows all stakeholders to see how our students are performing in the classroom. There are additional data points we will focus on as well. Those measures will be used to evaluate the progress on the culture and climate in the building.

The school wide distribution of grades provides data to determine the overall performance of our students in the classroom first quarter. The goal is for the A+ through D- columns to be more heavily populated than the F column.

Each quarter, students can affect their cumulative GPAs in a positive or negative way. The quarterly GPAs add up from quarter one through quarter four. Once the year is complete, each student’s cumulative GPA is recalculated. The cumulative GPA is what colleges and universities use as one admission requirement to be accepted. The higher the GPA, the more options our students will have by their Senior year.

Our Senior class had 79% of their students pass all seven classes in the first quarter. This was the highest passing rate out of the four classes. It is imperative that our Seniors continue to perform at a high level through the end of the year. The Seniors need to have a high school transcript that shows a consistent level of high performance in the classroom.

The Juniors had a good start to the year.  69% of the Juniors passed all seven classes. 14% passed six out of seven classes. Clearly we have some work to do but overall a good start. This year is vital for the Juniors to have good academic performance. The students’ cumulative GPA averages at the conclusion of this year will be the GPAs they will use it when applying to college in the fall. In addition, those Juniors considering the military will need to take the ASVAB assessment for placement.

The Sophomore class had the second highest passing rate in the first quarter. 70% of the Sophomores passed all seven classes. This is a good start to the year! This year is critical for all Sophomores when it comes to meeting graduation requirements. Sophomores have seven classes that are required to graduate as well as end of course exams they must perform well on in the spring

I cannot stress enough how important Freshman year is for students to earn good grades, pass all their classes, and build their pathway to graduation. Every class the Freshmen take is a requirement for graduation. Coming to school every day focused and prepared to learn builds a solid routine for success. The first quarter data shows our Freshman got off to a good start! 69% of our Freshmen passed all seven classes. The GPAs for first quarter were impressive as well, 37% of the Freshmen made Honor Roll.

First Quarter Highlights

We have a number of measures we look at to make sure we are building a positive productive learning environment for our students. We have “no phone use or earbud use” rules. The strategy is to reduce distractions in the building and increase human interaction without the technology. The second strategy is to create daily focus. We implemented hall sweeps to keep students focused on getting to class on time. We also implemented goal setting in advisory. The data we collect helps us determine how impactful the strategies are on the school environment. 

Data point one: Discipline referrals:

• While 705 discipline referrals seems like a lot, we should see a reduction in these numbers as the year goes on. The Freshmen will always have a lot in the first quarter because they are truly maturing and adjusting to high school. We will monitor these numbers each quarter. 

• We have had 379 cell phone violations. While this number is too high to put the data in perspective we have completed 45 days of school. We have roughly 849 students. We averaged 8 cell phone referrals a day which is one referral for every 106 students. Please keep in mind we have about 25 repeat offenders who represent almost 100 of the 379 referrals. We have to stay vigilant with enforcing the rules to keep reducing the number of referrals. 

Focus Fridays:

• Teachers have acknowledged good examples of student behavior and performance in the classroom. We have handed out 349 positive referrals from teachers. 

• Staff is acknowledging students who have set goals in advisory and achieved them. We have had over 400 students set weekly goals and achieve those goals this semester. 

Honor Roll:

• Freshmen: 104 students earned Honor Roll status 
• Sophomores: 85 students earned Honor Roll status 
• Juniors: 91 students earned Honor Roll status 
• Seniors: 101 students earned Honor Roll status 

College and Career Readiness:

• Seniors and Juniors attended 5th/3rd college night
• Seniors and Juniors traveled to the National College Fair in Cincinnati
• West Carrollton High School held their own college fair 

(Our first one, over 20 colleges and universities )

• Military Mondays: All branches have been to school 
• Participated in Manufacturing Day
• Announced December 5th at West Carrollton High School will host a Career fair

These measures and results have established a good start to the school year. The hardest step now is to build on the good start. WE MUST STAY THE COURSE!!! We must keep improving on our academic performance, our focus, being on time, and prepared.