K-12 News

     Oswego City School District Interim Superintendent of Schools Gary Mix talked about the positives and the goals for the students during the most recent board of education meeting.

     Mix noted that he was enthused and excited over what he had seen in the opening days of the new school year.

     During a presentation held on the first day as professional and support staff returned to the district, Mix encouraged them to "commit to attend two students activities that you have not gone to in the past, commit to growing professionally and staying on the edge of your comfort zone and to strive for perfect attendance" in order to realize an outstanding year."

     He asked Assistant Superintendent of Instruction and Curriculum Cathleen Chamberlain and the Director of Personnel and Human Resources Peter Myles to provide an overview of the progress and goals that the district is working toward.

     Chamberlain provided a comparison of test scores among the nine school districts in Oswego County.

     The Oswego City School District students were ranked first in the county in the seventh and eighth grade English Language Arts tests. The district was second in sixth grade ELA, and grade three, five and eight mathematics.

     Of the nine districts in Oswego ranked third in ELA grades three and five as well as mathematics in grades six and seven.

     In 10 of the 12 categories the students in the Oswego City School District ranked among the top three.

     Chamberlain explained to the board, "While we continue with our focus this year on improving instructional practices which will in turn improve our students' academic achievement, the look at where we fell in the country was in most cases very positive."

     This year's state test results were not surprising.

     New York State Education Commissioner John King had anticipated a substantial reduction in the percent of students that would be proficient on the test.

     "This is due to the fact that the standards have changed and our instruction will need to be aligned to these new standards," Chamberlain explained. "The fact that the new Common Core aligned resources were just coming out in August is one huge causal factor for this achievement drop. We will be using these resources in our district this coming year."