During the Armorel School District’s annual Report to the Public, the administration announced this year’s goals for both elementary and high school.
The district is fully accredited by the Arkansas Department of Education. Armorel Elementary received an ‘A’ rating, while Armorel High School received a ‘B’ rating, during the 2018-2019 academic school year based on their ESSA Index score.
Superintendent Tiffany Morgan said, “The state looks at different criteria to determine the school’s rating. Of course the big component is their achievement data. This past year we did not test because of COVID, so these test scores are actually a carryover from the 2018-2019 school year. They look at the number of students that have grown on the ACT Aspire testing. They also give a certain number of points for graduation rates.”
Morgan added, “Armorel Elementary has been an ‘A’ school for some years off and on, sometimes they’ll rotate to a ‘B’. Our goal overall is that not only will Armorel Elementary school continue to be an ‘A’ but Armorel High School will join them and be an ‘A’ as well.”
Morgan explained how the district plans on achieving the goal of having both schools receive an ‘A’ rating by the end of the school year.
“We’re going to do that by increasing student performance in reading and math, increasing student attendance, and increasing community service hours so that the high school gets ESSA points for those community service hours,” said Morgan.
Morgan also discussed some of the facilities improvements as well as this year’s goal for the High School campus.
“We have just completed construction and got moved into our new elementary building. That building consists of two safe rooms that can house all of our elementary staff and students,” said Morgan, “We have expanded the parking lot. Our future plans are to have a safe room at the high school.”
Armorel High School Principal Tony Crowell went in detail on how the school plans to move up to an ‘A’ rating this year.
Crowell said, “It takes everybody to become an ‘A’ school. In part of that, we are going to increase the capacity of teachers to grow. I want our teachers to be able to take ownership of their classrooms, their students, their growth, futures and involvement at Armorel High School.”
Crowell continued, “We have great students, they are compliant. But we need to take that learning piece to the next level. We need to allow opportunities whether it be hands-on instruction or virtual side of things.”
Crowell said embracing the new virtual world is one of the school’s biggest challenges.
“It has taken teachers and myself a while to understand that embracing this new virtual world doesn’t look like what we have seen before,” he said. “ There are many moving parts to this machine and we are looking forward to the challenge and we will become an ‘A’ high school.”
Armorel Elementary School Principal Joey Carr also presented goals for the elementary school this year.
“Two of our primary goals in addition to continuing our success in the past is to create a rigorous, instructional curriculum full of activities for our on-campus and virtual learners,” said Carr. “We try to have those mirrored as much as possible, that way they’re getting the same experience. Not all the time will that occur but we strive to do so, that way whether they are at home or in the classroom they have as similar an experience as possible. Our other goal is to implement effective, instructional strategies and resources. We are able to measure these through student learning data and teacher observations.”
It was announced on the school website that Friday, Sept.18 would be the district’s first of several Blended Learning Days. During a Blended Learning Day, students will be working virtually from home.
The statement explains, “On these days, our building will be more stringently cleaned and sanitized. This will also give students, teachers, and staff the opportunity to prepare and plan for virtual days. We want to test our technology platform and work out the kinks to ensure the smoothest possible learning opportunity for students and teachers alike.”