Success is sweet for one Nyssa school

By William Lundquist - Argus Observer
Wednesday, October 10, 2007 11:24 AM PDT

Nyssa - “Dreams are changing.”

Those words, uttered by Nyssa School District Assistant Superintendent Janine Weeks, summed up the accomplishments of Nyssa Middle School when it earned an “exceptional” overall rating on the Oregon Department of Education’s 2006 to 2007 State Report Card.

Weeks was referring to students’ post-graduation aspirations, but she could as well have been talking about the expectations of the teachers, staff, administration, parents and students of her district.

Consider that last year only 147 schools in Oregon were rated “exceptional” overall. Few of those learning institutions were middle schools. How many were in small rural towns with a majority of students living in poverty, many living in homes where English is not the primary language?

Nyssa Middle School Principal Jana Iverson said Monday she did not know of any other Oregon middle school with Nyssa’s demographics that earned an “exceptional” rating this year.

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Nyssa School District Superintendent Don Grotting said he isn’t even interested in demographics.

“We don’t want any excuses,” he said, “Whether it’s ethnicity, poverty, whatever. We want to compete with districts everywhere, not just those with our demographics.”

Iverson agreed.

“I think this is leading to a school where race and socio-economics don’t predict success,” Iverson said, paraphrasing a favorite quote.

That theme seemed to be a given to the school’s teachers, who appeared to be more surprised by the pizza celebration Iverson sprang on them Monday than their “exceptional” rating.

“Our teachers truly believe that, regardless of a child’s background, any child can excel,” Grotting said. Iverson said the teachers were confident the school would improve on the “satisfactory” rating of the past two school years, but they were pleased and mildly surprised the school leapfrogged the “strong” rating to garner the top prize. The achievement of the middle school is no fluke in the small district. According to Oregon Department of Education records, Nyssa Elementary School scored a “strong” this year on the state report card, as it has every year since 2002. The school also earned two “exceptional” ratings during the 2002 to 2003 and 2003 to 2004 academic years. The middle school also met the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) requirements of the federal government every year.

Nyssa High School rated “satisfactory” on the latest school report card, following two “strong” report cards. The high school has also met its AYP requirements each year since the 2002 to 2003 school year.

District administrators believe the consistent strength of the elementary school has now moved up to the middle school level and can only strengthen the high school’s performance in the future. The high school did earn an “exceptional” rating in the attendance/dropout/student behavior category on state school report card.

By the numbers, Nyssa students beat the state average in reading and math in five of the seven grades tested. Nyssa students beat the state average two out of three grades tested for writing, and were only below the state average in 10th grade by 1 percent on the school report card.

Grotting said the against-the-odds success of his district has others around the state asking him about his “magic bullet.”

“Everyone wants to duplicate it,” he said, “But you can’t duplicate the people or the leadership, or just believing in the kids.”

Iverson said the efforts of individual educators in the district is the difference.

“The real key is the teachers,” Iverson said. “We have a really good staff and they love doing good.”

Weeks added the parents and students are just as important in the success formula. Grotting, she said, insists on 100 percent attendance for parent-teacher conferences and gets it. Sometimes that takes providing baby-sitting or transportation for the parents. Sometimes the teachers go out to the homes. The students, said Iverson, lead the conferences and back it up with their own work.

Part of the key to scoring high in government testing is simply wanting to, Weeks said. Some states spend their time fighting the federal “No Child Left Behind” requirements, she said. Nyssa has the attitude, she said, “If this is the game, then we’re going to be the best at it.”

“There is no doubt NCLB has made schools more accountable,” Grotting said.

Weeks said Nyssa students now read much better than when she joined the district in 1991.

“The kids can do better than they ever had before. They are actually learning much more,” she said.

Iverson said Hispanic students are closing the gap with other students so rapidly they will soon set the scores to beat in some categories.

Even though a high percentage of the students come from homes of poverty, Weeks said, many high-schoolers are now thinking about college after graduation. For the families of some former migrant families who put down roots in Nyssa, dreams seem to be changing.