For several years, Geary Elementary has struggled to improve its marks on the state’s school report card. The report card notes such categories as how many students are learning English as a second language, how many are economically disadvantaged and the number of kids who struggle to make it to school every day, or chronic absenteeism.
This year the school was one of 117 that have pulled their marks up far enough to be removed from the list of failing schools. The Oklahoma State Department of Education calls it meeting exit criteria.
The school now has two options, whether to continue working with support specialists in the office of school support through 2024-25 or discontinue the support specialist intervention.
The first option includes completing the continuous improvement plan while receiving monthly visits from the specialists and continued Title 1 funding.
The second option is to discontinue working with the specialists. This would end the support, monitoring and additional funding. Those funds, instead, are transferred to other newly identified failing schools.
Superintendent Sean Buchanan hasn’t publicly announced which option Geary will select.
The state report shows that Geary Elementary changed its chronic absentee rate from 59% being in class regularly to 82% attending regularly and improved its academic growth rate from 38% to 75%. That means that three-quarters of students testing met or exceeded the expected mastery of various school topics.
Research at the school showed the school tackled absenteeism at the root cause and worked with the local authorities and the C&A tribe to stimulate attendance. The school also showed parents how missing school impacted learning.
Further research showed reading was a stumbling block for students. Using various teaching programs and improvement plans from the department of education, students started individual improvement plans and track their progress.
“ The remedial specialists, instructional coaches, and teachers are a phenomenal team and are executing their school improvement plan and reading strategies flawlessly with students to achieve academic improvement and growth,” the department wrote in its findings.
It also noted principal Joy Osborne fostered a positive culture among staff and the community. Teachers feel supported and data is driving their instruction.
Previously, a school listed as failing on the state report card had to wait for the next grading period to end, but changes at the OSDE now allow a school that meets exit criteria is removed from the list right away.
It could meet the exit criteria by improving the total score enough to climb out of the bottom 5% of schools statewide, or it may have improved low performances enough that it passed similar student groups in schools with the bottom 5% designation.
Superintendent Sean Buchanan was unavailable as of press time for input into this story.