Two suburban districts given exemplary status as state names reward schools
Collierville district makes history with seven reward schools
Students flood the halls of the new Collierville High School on its first day of school in 2018. (Houston Cofield/The Daily Memphian file)
For the first time in Collierville Schools history, the suburban district has seven reward schools.
The Tennessee Department of Education designates reward schools based on 2021-22 TCAP data. The honor is reserved for schools in the top 5% for performance, growth or both.
Bailey Station Elementary, Crosswind Elementary, Schilling Farms Elementary, Sycamore Elementary, Tara Oaks Elementary, West Collierville Middle School and Collierville High School were all in that top tier.
Gary Lilly
State testing is used to hold districts accountable to one standard. Schools and systems that don’t meet certain criteria may receive extra support from the state.
Collierville Middle School was flagged as a target support and improvement school in 2019 because of low achievement and chronic absenteeism among economically disadvantaged students. The state uses two years of testing to let schools roll off the list. There was no state testing in 2020 due to the pandemic. However, with the past two years of TCAP scores, CMS is no longer on the list.
Collierville and Lakeland School System were named Exemplary Districts, the highest mark the Tennessee Department of Education gives school systems. Only 16 districts were given the designation, and Collierville and Lakeland were the only two achieving the status in Shelby County.
“After the learning disruptions over the past couple of years, we have really focused on strengthening foundational skills and moving children forward,” Collierville Superintendent Gary Lilly said in a release. “The Exemplary District designation speaks volumes about the hard work and dedication of our teachers, staff, students, and families.”
Lakeland Superintendent Ted Horrell said the school district is still looking for ways to improve.
“Every year, we use the data we have to try to get better, and we’re already hard at work to improve upon last year’s results. We’re so proud of our students and teachers for not only these results but for so many other successes that are not measured in data
Lakeland Elementary was also named a reward school.
In Germantown Municipal School District, Dogwood Elementary, Farmington Elementary, Forest Hill Elementary and Houston High School were given reward status.
In Bartlett, all six elementary schools earned reward status, as well as Appling Middle School.
Bon Lin Middle School in Bartlett was designated as a target support and improvement school.
Jason Sykes, a spokesperson for Bartlett City Schools, said Bon Lin Middle is one of 89 schools statewide with a certain subgroup of students, although he declined to identify the subgroup. Although the students had high achievement growth, it was lower than the other 89 schools with a certain number of students in that group.
If Bon Lin improves enough over the next two years, it could be removed from the list in 2024.
Topics
Collierville Schools Lakeland Schools Bartlett City Schools Germantown Municipal School District TCAP scores exemplary district Reward SchoolsAbigail Warren
Abigail Warren is an award-winning reporter and covers Collierville and Germantown for The Daily Memphian. She was raised in the Memphis suburbs, attended Westminster Academy and studied journalism at the University of Memphis. She has been with The Daily Memphian since 2018.
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