Superintendent lauds “Beating the Odds” schools at Dougherty Board of Education meeting

ALBANY — Twelve schools within the Dougherty County School System are outperforming schools across Georgia with similar student populations and another five are within “expected range.”

Dougherty County School Superintendent Ken Dyer made the announcement at the Dougherty County Board of Education meeting on Monday evening.

The Governor’s Office of Student Achievement made an announcement recently concerning its “Beating the Odds” statistical analysis that compares a school’s actual performance on the College and Career Ready Performance Index with the performance of schools with similar characteristics across the state.

Schools that perform higher than similar schools are considered “Beating the Odds.”

“I’m proud of the work that our school leaders, teachers and, most of all, our students continue to do in our schools every day and I think that the results of this year’s Beating-the-Odds analysis show that we’re making considerable progress,” Dyer said at the BOE’s pre-briefing prior to the meeting. “The fact that 17 of our 21 schools met or exceeded the state’s performance expectations is an indication that our system-wide improvement efforts have been effective.

“That being said, we’ll continue to push ourselves to grow so that all of our schools are outperforming their peer groups across the state.”

In addition to the schools who are “Beating the Odds,” five additional schools were determined to be “within expected range,” GOSA said. Those schools are Robert H. Harvey Elementary, Robert A. Cross Middle Magnet School, Monroe Comprehensive High School, Northside Elementary School and Westover Comprehensive High School.

All told, officials said 81 percent of DCSS schools are “Beating the Odds” or performing within expected range according to this year’s report.

To determine whether a school is “Beating the Odds,” state officials compare schools across the state based on a variety of characteristics including:

— Percentage of economically disadvantaged students;

— Percentage of English language learners;

— Percentage of students with disabilities;

— Percentage of students in each race/ethnicity;

— Percentage of female students;

— Student mobility;

— School size;

— Whether a school is defined as non-traditional by GOSA;

— School type: elementary, middle, high and schools that span grade clusters.

While schools are added and removed to the list based on their characteristics and performance annually, officials said two DCSS schools have made the “Beating the Odds” list every year since the state started the program in 2012 — Merry Acres Middle School and Radium Springs Elementary School.