Wyoming education officials confident that students are improving

Under No Child Left Behind benchmarks, 14 Wyoming School Districts and 180 schools failed to make what is called Adequate Yearly Progress.  That is a large increase from last year, but Wyoming’s Department of Education says that does not necessarily mean there is cause for alarm. 

Diane Frazer oversees A-Y-P for the Wyoming Department of Education and she says the issue is that benchmarks for proficiency are higher than they have ever been.  One thing she stresses is that when you look at A-Y-P and other measurement tools, Wyoming students are actually doing very well.

“If you look at growth I think we’ve grown quite a bit over the years.  Wyoming has steadily increased in its percentage of proficient students.  This goes back eight years now and we can show that growth over that time.  Are we where we want to be?  Of course not.

But Frazer says the State Department of Education will continue working with schools and districts to improve.  She also notes that the majority of students and schools are meeting federal benchmarks.