Dear Parents/Guardians, Community Members, and Staff:
In the spring of 2017, like all other public school districts in Arizona, FHUSD participated in the third year of AzMERIT testing. AzMERIT assessments are given to all students in grades 3 through 11 in the areas of English Language Arts (Reading and Writing) and Math. If your student tested last spring, their individual results have been sent home to you already.
At the October 4, 2017 governing board meeting, I will be sharing information related to how our students performed over a three-year period on AzMERIT. In general, we have seen steady improvement in results at most grade levels in both ELA and Math. A few of the highlights from the spring of 2017 results include seeing our third grade combined percentage of students who scored proficient or highly proficient increase from 49% to 65% in ELA and from 49% to 72% in Math. These significant gains were realized at McDowell Mountain while proficiency levels statewide remained basically flat at approximately 42% and 46% respectively. At the high school, we saw a double-digit increase in students proficient or highly proficient in Algebra, increasing from 47% to 57% between 2016 and 2017, compared to the state average increasing from 36% to 39%. More impressively, the percentage of our Geometry students who scored at the proficient or highly proficient levels increased from 46% to 63% while the state average decreased 1% point from 35% to 34%. I tip my hat to the students, parents, teachers, and principals who put in the time and effort necessary to realize such improvements.
Keep in mind that teachers have multiple ways they measure student learning and AzMERIT is just one of those tools. Throughout the school year, there are many ways teachers assess how students are doing in their classroom, including classwork, homework, quizzes, projects, and teacher and counselor observations about your child's growth.
The Arizona Department of Education has set up a separate website for a variety of things related to AzMERIT and it includes resources intended specifically for students and families. Here's a link:
http://azmeritportal.org/students-and-families/ When you go to that site, you'll see buttons for Student and Family Resources, Sample Tests, and Arizona Academic Standards. I encourage you to spend some time exploring these resources and determining ways you can help your student increase their personal level of student achievement and academic proficiency.
Working together we can make FHUSD's schools the best in Arizona.
