While the district and school report cards released by Oregon Department of Education do not paint a complete picture of the 2020-21 school year, Morrow County School District continues to look at key pieces of data in our efforts to improve student engagement and graduation outcomes.
The district and high school level report cards provide some key information about student success both from the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school years. Graduation data posted in the report cards is reflective of the graduating class of 2020 and highlight that at 92%, the district’s graduation rate is 9% higher than the state average.
MCSD also maintained the 9th grade on-track to graduate rates, which remain a solid indicator for graduation outcomes. Across the district 94% of freshmen earned six or more credits during their 2020-21 school year despite the challenges of distance and limited in-person learning.
More significant is that as the district looks across their student demographic groups, there are not significant achievement gaps between groups. Superintendent Dirk Dirksen said that one of the things the district continually focuses on is providing services specific to student needs; this work is reflected in the graduation rates for historically underserved populations, which are at or above the district and state averages.
The district regular attendance data, while not comparable to past years due to changes in reporting rules, does provide some information for buildings. “looking at our regular attender rates as compared to similar districts, we cannot overemphasize the importance of our efforts in opening our schools to in-person learning early in the 2020-21 school year,” stated Dirksen.