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Cub Reporter Lawrence Central High School
7300 E. 56th St.
Volume 62, Issue 5
Indianapolis, Indiana
January 21, 2011
Stats show need for improvement
Federal and state systems put LC on academic probation GregPrice gregpricecub@gmail.com
According to Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and Public Law 221 (PL221), LC is a failing school. AYP is a federal accountability system that tracks the progress of a school, while PL221 is a state system that does the same. LC has not met AYP since 2004, and after four years of being on academic watch under PL221, LC is now on academic probation. Last year, LC passed only seven out of 27 subgroups. Fourteen of the subgroups are based on performance, seven in math and seven in English/language arts for ISTEP. The other subgroups are based on participation and graduation rate. To meet parWe can go up and ticipation categories, higher from (where 95 percent of students take the exam. we were at the be- mustThe whole point of ginning of the year). these two systems is to Kevin Brown assess schools and make they are improving principal sure every year. According to PL221, LC saw a 4.3 percent decrease in 2009-2010. With all this focus on school improvement comes the topic of school accreditation. Accreditation is on a five-year cycle, and this year marks the year that LC must be re-accredited. An external group, Advanced Ed, will visit in April to decide if it will accredit LC. This group decides what the school is doing well, and what it needs to work on.
news
AP biology students looked at more than phenotypes in their recent monthlong experiment. Fly to page 3 to learn more about LC’s DNA.
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Principal Kevin Brown said he is “excited” about this process and welcomes it as a test to see how far along LC is toward its goal of excellence. “We can go up and higher from (where we were at the beginning of the year),” Brown said. “Accreditation means that the curriculum set forth is quality, there are highly qualified teachers and a quality education for students,” said associate principal Kristie Corn, who is in charge of preparing the
features
See the true ramifications that can result from text messages while driving on pages 14-15.
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Cub graphic/Shane Ruggles Information source/Indiana Dept. of Education
school for the Advanced Ed audit. LC is doing many things to prepare for Advanced Ed and the accreditation process that are different from past years. The most notable change is the addition of the curriculum-guided vocabulary in some classes. The vocabulary was added to “increase academic achievement through improved reading comprehension,” Corn said. Improvement on reading is a large goal for
The Demon Barber of Fleet Street is coming to LC. Check out page 20 to see more on one of LC’s most controversial productions to date.
– See ACCREDITATION on page 6
sports
Turn to page 26 to find the truth about performance-enhancing equipment, and whether they really work or if they are just a scam.