In the Loop
Get Connected with Fremont Public Schools
You and I are busy people. We have no real opportunity to get together for a chat. Yet we do have new ways we can “talk.” That’s the point of In the Loop: a format for sharing with you regular insights of life at Fremont Public Schools.
Please share In the Loop with your friends. Or have them send me their email address, and I’ll send it to them personally.
John Kingsnorth, Superintendent
jkingsnorth@fremont.net
Monday November 5, 2007
CROSS COUNTRY STATE CHAMPIONS!!!
Click Here for Coach Somers Report on the State Champions
FREMONT GIRLS FINISH 16TH AT MHSAA CROSS COUNTRY CHAMPIONSHIP
Click Here for Coach Lindsays Report
THE MEAP SNAFU
As you probably read in the papers a couple of weeks ago, there was a breach of the MEAP test which necessitates our kids taking a portion of the test over again. Below is the email I was sent regarding this issue.
State Superintendent Mike Flanagan wanted me to drop you all a note following a couple of newspaper editorials on the replacement test for the 5th and 6th grade MEAP writing prompt to be administered on Nov. 7. The newspapers distorted a few of the facts that we have shared with you all previously, but we feel may need some reinforcing.
- This entire situation was not the doing of the Michigan Department of Education. It was a security breach by a local school district, which led to a newspaper article that divulged the writing prompts for the 5th and 6th grade MEAP tests.
- When the department learned of the breach, we were concerned not only with the possibility of the prompts becoming known to other students across the state who had not taken the test, but the fairness to those students who already had taken the tests, the integrity of the MEAP tests themselves, and the protection of the AYP status of all of the schools affected.
- We determined that if, because of the breach, the U.S. Department of Education later ruled all of the MEAP writing tests were invalid, all of the schools affected would not make AYP.
- We spoke with the U.S. Department of Education who gave us a verbal expression of concern that failing to test ALL grade 5 and 6 students using a replacement prompt threatens the validity of the writing scores, and that there is a real risk that all schools in the state of Michigan with 5th and 6th graders would not make AYP if any other course of action were taken.
- Unless we had a written statement from the U.S. Department of Education saying that we DID NOT have to test all students, we weren't going to take the chance of the feds coming back at a later date and invalidating the tests - and causing all of the schools to not make AYP and the feds never put themselves on the line like that - by actually putting things like that in writing.
We aren't happy to be having to administer a replacement MEAP writing test anymore than the schools are. This breach is costing MDE hundreds of thousand of dollars to administer this replacement prompt, for goodness sakes! But we had no choice, given the gravity of the consequences and what was at risk for all of the schools.
Mike wants you all to know that MDE did not make the decision to test all 5th and 6th graders easily. We took many things into consideration and made the correct decision in an unfortunate situation to ensure fairness to all students, and prevent the risk to your schools and district of not making AYP.
Martin Ackley, Director
Office of Communications
Michigan Department of Education
STATE AID PACKAGE THAT MAY BE PASSED SOON
With all the haggling still taking place in Lansing, we are hoping that this is the final state aid package.
There will be a Foundation increase for all school districts and there will be an additional equity payment on a sliding scale for all districts up to the new Foundation top step. Calculation:
a. 2006-07 base - $7085 plus $23 equity payment. Total $7108. 2007-08 base - $7108 plus the Foundation increase of $48. Total $7156. Plus an equity payment of $48 for the Foundation base districts will make the new 2007-08 Foundation base of $7204
b. All others above the Foundation base will receive a sliding equity payment in a decreasing amount as a district approaches the new Foundation top step of $8433 and the Hold Harmless districts that will total higher per pupil from an additional local millage levy.
c. The decline in the equity payment of $48 this year will be a few dollars per category of Aid payment until there would be no equity payment for the top step of $8433.
If I was still a superintendent, I would take the difference between $7204 and $8433 or $1229 and take my current per pupil amount, add the roll-in of $23 and the new Foundation of $48, or $71, and compute what percentage of the $1229 is my district. I would be at or very close to where the Equity Payment would provide my district for 2007-08.
d. It is the intent of this legislation to have this "2x" equity system continue indefinitely into future Aid bills.
The K-12 appropriations conference report is finished and has been agreed to in the conference committee. Highlights in the report include:
· Sets a new basic foundation allowance for 2007-08 of $8433
· Districts at or above the new base will receive an increase of $48
· Districts at the 2006-07 minimum of $7108 will receive $96
· Districts in between will receive an increase on a sliding scale based on the formula between $48 and $96 per pupil
· Increase in school readiness per-child allocation from $3300 to $3400 per slot
UPDATE ON MIDDLE SCHOOL TEACHER
After months of waiting for the trial, Middle School teacher Bob Kosztowny was finally found not guilty in the court proceedings last Friday. As many of you know from the newspaper and t.v. Bob was in court on an assault and battery complaint for which the jury after deliberating for a whopping five minutes, found him not guilty. The jury felt as we did that this issue did not belong in court.
In the Loop
Get Connected with Fremont Public Schools
John D. KingsnorthSuperintendent
Fremont Public Schools
(231) 924-2350
jkingsnorth@fremont.net