Havre schools doing well, despite AYP, Carlson says

Havre Public Schools Superintendent Andy Carlson interpreted the districts' recently released Adequate Yearly Progress results for the Board of Trustees at its Tuesday night meeting.

The district failed to meet the rapidly increasing standards set up by the No Child Left Behind act of 2002, which will require 100 percent of students to be proficient or better in math and reading by 2014.

Several parts of the school system did achieve "safe harbor" for their performance in other standards, like attendance and graduation rates.

Carlson said that he doesn't think the evaluation holds up compared to the amount of work and effort he sees in Havre schools, and it's hard to tell these teachers that the federal government's complex standards continue to say they aren't good enough.

"It's hard to tell teachers to continue forth and that they are making progress and have to explain something like AYP, " Carlson said. "I do not think AYP is at all indicative of the work and time that goes into our schools every day.

"It's hard to start a school year being told you're not making it. "