Parish schools recognized for student achievement

Four St. Mary Parish high schools ranked nationally in the U.S. News and World Report for top student achievement.
Morgan City, Berwick, Franklin and West St. Mary high schools were among the 82 in the state that met the bronze level standard.
U.S. News teamed up with the Washington, D.C.-based American Institutes for Research, one of the largest behavioral and social science research organizations in the world, to conduct the data analysis for the project, according to their website.
The magazine started out by analyzing 31,242 public high schools in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. That number was reduced to 19,411 schools, the total number of public high schools across the country that had high enough 12th-grade enrollment and sufficient data from the 2011-12 school year to be eligible for the rankings.
Schools that make the list must have students that score at a statistically higher average than other students when economically disadvantaged status is factored. Students in the school must then perform better than average for similar students in the state, Superintendent Donald Aguillard said in a news release.
Three percent of schools in the nation received a gold award for meeting college readiness standards. Nine percent of schools in the nation received a silver award recognizing high student performance with a lower college readiness score, and 15 percent of schools received a bronze award recognizing high student performance on state exams.
“The national recognition is especially appropriate in a time of great transition in Louisiana high school accountability. The national recognition supports the district goal of meeting the diverse learning needs of all students while attaining high graduation rates,” Aguillard said.
While Patterson and Centerville high schools were unranked, both schools scored near the Louisiana average for student achievement in English and algebra, Aguillard noted.
None of St. Mary Parish high schools are ranked for college readiness, according to information from U.S. News & World Report.
The U.S. News and World Report, includes the percent of students proficient in algebra and English:
—Berwick: 89 percent, algebra; 95 percent, English.
—Franklin: 72 percent, algebra; 85 percent, English.
—Morgan City: 85 percent, algebra; 91 percent, English.
—West St. Mary: 83 percent, algebra; 87 percent, English.
—Centerville: 81 percent, algebra; 95 percent, English.
—Patterson: 73 percent, algebra; 88 percent, English.
Central Catholic, like all parochial schools, is not ranked. While charter and magnet schools are ranked, Glencoe Charter School does not have high school grades.