EDUCATION: AREA DROP-OUT RATES DOWN

Good attendance rates, rising student scores on Missouri Assessment Program exams and low drop- out rates characterized the 1999-2000 district profiles recently released by Delta, Meadow Heights and Scott City school districts.

Public schools were required to make district profiles available to legislators, news media and the public by Dec. 1. The district profiles show the improvements and failures in a school system for the previous year.

Details regarding college testing scores, achievement test results, staff salaries, student-to-teacher ratios, per-pupil expenditures, revenue and tax rates are included in the reports, which also compare local figures to state averages.

Meadow Heights School District

District Superintendent Duane Schindler said an enrollment increase last year caused student-to-teacher ratios to rise somewhat, but the district showed improvement in several other criteria.

Schindler, in his second year at Meadow Heights, said scores have improved somewhat, but overall, students produced scores that were in similar or somewhat lower ranges than the previous year.

A lack of sincere effort at the high school level and individual abilities are probably the reason for the lack of advancement that was made, he said.

"It seems like it's harder to get our high school students to take testing seriously," Schindler said. "It's not peculiar to us, but that is one of our goals to make sure they give it a 100 percent effort."

Delta School District

Delta students attended school fairly often last year, but nowhere near the 99.41 percent rate listed in the district's profile. Rather, the district's rate of attendance was 95.48 percent, slightly above the state average of 95.25 percent.

District Superintendent Tom Allen said a computing error by state education officials resulted in the incorrect information being forwarded to the school district.

Outside of the error, Allen said, he was pleased by the progress his district showed in several areas last year. An academically minded group of graduates outscored state and national averages on the ACT college entrance exam, and MAP scores also showed students moving from the lowest two scoring sections and into the top two levels.

Although school officials continue to improve class offerings at the high school, Allen said the district has been hindered by its small size, rural location and salaries that are lower on average than surrounding school districts.

For example, students interested in studying foreign languages must enroll in special computer-assisted learning classes because the district has been unable to fill a part-time teaching position.

"There's nothing at all a small school can do about that," Allen said. "For the most part we just don't have the numbers to go into those, but we still need to offer them to do the best we can for our students."

Scott City School District

District Superintendent Roger Tatum said he had a lot to be proud of last year. In addition to improved student achievement and student attendance, the district's drop-out rate was 1.9 percent last year, far below the 5.0 percent state average, and the 93.8 percent graduate rate outpaced the state average by more than 14 percentage points.

Tatum said the district also moved closer to matching the average state teacher's salary last year. Scott City educators, with an average teacher's salary of $33,221, already have one of the better salary schedules in the region and the lowest base salary -- $25,000 -- in the immediate area.

Even so, Tatum said he would like to see more improvement in salaries.

"It sounds bad to say you're trying to get up to average, but that's what we're doing," Tatum said. "We're proud of what we've done and want to continue to try and get ours up there."