WINNSBORO – The recently released SC Ready scores measure readiness in English-Language Arts and Math for students in grades 3-8.
Top Performer
Fairfield Magnet Math & Science again this year was the district’s top performer, where 74.3% of third graders met or exceeded expectations in ELA.
Nearly 70% of fifth graders at the magnet school met or exceeded expectations while nearly 82% of sixth graders met or exceeded expectations.
In Math, 60 percent of third graders met or exceeded expectations while only 5.7% did not meet expectations.
Nearly 72% of fifth graders met or exceeded expectations and nobody failed to meet expectations, according to the data.
Sixth graders also scored well with 58.6% meeting or exceeding expectations and only 12.1% not meeting expectations.
Fourth grade results were not available because fewer than 20 students were tested. The Department of Education doesn’t publish results when fewer than 20 students take the exam, according to the DOE website.
Compared to the state
Data shows that Fairfield County schools lagged behind the state in almost every grade level in failing to meet expectations for English-Language Arts and Math.
One in four Fairfield students are not meeting expectations in English-Language Arts while one in three failed to meet expectations in Math, according to scores.
Only in Grade 6 ELA (19.1%), Grade 5 Math (15.6%), and Grade 8 Math (38.3%) did Fairfield have less students failing to meet expectations than the state.
At Tuesday night’s monthly school board meeting, district officials touted an upward trend in recent years.
“I just want to say kudos to the children, the administrators and parents,” said board vice chair Sylvia Harrison. “I know a lot of hard work in taking those assessments pays off in the long run.”
Dr. Claudia Avery, deputy superintendent for academics, said the number of students district wide meeting or exceeding expectations in ELA rose from 31% to 46% since 2021.
In Math, the percentage of students meeting or exceeding expectations rose from 25% to 32%. SC PASS, which measures science scores in seventh grade only, shed 2 percentage points, she said.
The 2023 results represent student achievement for the first full year of in-person instruction following the COVID-19 pandemic.
As of April 2021, nearly all of the state’s 79 school districts, including Fairfield, had resumed 100% in person learning, according to the S.C. Department of Education.
“Our students are steadily making improvements and they are recovering from the impacts of the pandemic,” Avery said.
Avery’s presentation focused on the district as a whole. It did not call attention to individual grade levels or how specific schools performed.
Fairfield Elementary
In ELA, 38.23% of Fairfield Elementary’s students did not meeting expectations in ELA and almost half (49.2%) did not meeting expectations in Math.
Over half (54.2%) of third graders in ELA and over half of third graders (52.1%) in Math didn’t meet expectations.
Also over half of fourth graders (53.7%) and nearly two-thirds of sixth graders (61.7%) in Math didn’t meet expectations, according to the data.
Avery pointed to other data that she said shows notable SC Ready gains. Among them include:
- 170 students scored in 90th percentile or above in ELA
- 66 students scored in 90th percentile or above in Math
- 1 student achieved a perfect score in SC Ready Math
- 2 students achieved highest attainable score on SC Ready ELA
Breakdown by School
Here’s a breakdown of how other Fairfield schools performed:
At Geiger Elementary, 57% met or exceeded expectations in ELA, while 43.2% met or exceeded expectations in Math.
Kelly Miller Elementary saw 43.7% of students in grades 3, 4, and 6 meet or exceed expectations in ELA, while 33.3% met or exceeded expectations in Math.
Fifth grade scores weren’t counted because fewer than 20 students took the test. Test results aren’t made public when fewer than 20 students are tested, according to the Department of Education.
Fairfield Middle reported 44.6% meeting or exceeding expectations in ELA while 23.3% met or exceeded expectations in Math.
Scores from McCrorey Liston were unavailable because fewer than 20 students in each grade level took the test, according to the Department of Education.
