CINCINNATI — Cincinnati Public Schools addressed the district’s academics, culture and behavior during the State of the Schools address Tuesday night.
The annual address comes a few months after the Ohio Department of Education released its report cards. It was the first time the department released the grades since the COVID-19 pandemic started.
Overall, CPS is not meeting any state standards. The report card uses a star-based rating on a scale from one to five. A 3-star rating would mean the district is meeting state standards.
Here's how the district scored:
- Achievement - 2 stars
- Progress - 2 stars
- Gap Closing - 2 stars
- Graduation - 1 star
- Early Literacy - 2 stars
CPS' current graduation rate is around 78%. To improve to two stars, which is still below a satisfactory level, the district would need to increase that rate to at least 84%.
Some individual CPS schools did receive a 5-star rating in some of these areas. However, most schools did not.
"A bit concerned. At the same time optimistic and hopeful," said Kendra Mapp, a CPS parent of three.
Mapp was one of a handful of parents, staff and partners who attended Tuesday's address.
"It is important that we do get the foundation back together so that we are able to excel and move forward," she said.
CPS is the second-largest K-12 school district in the state of Ohio with 65 schools, more than 36,000 students and 6,282 employees.
Currently, CPS is among the worst-performing districts. Out of 607 districts in the state, it's ranked 587.
Meanwhile, three other Hamilton County districts — Loveland, Madeira and Sycamore — all tied for first with perfect scores.
Wright said the district is more than just a report card, but it does show there’s room for improvement. She said COVID-19 is largely to blame for the performance drop.
“My thoughts when the report card came out is that we are still coming off a pandemic, and so we want to make sure we are really focused in the areas that may be of concern, so we can work with our families, work with our staff, so they are very clear on we’re going next as a district because we have a lot of work to do,” Wright said.
Wright said fixing the scores comes down to strengthening Tier 1 — or core — curriculum, which boils down to what students are learning in the classroom, and paying better attention to early literacy and high school math.
Wright reminded the room Tuesday that all CPS students must take and pass Algebra 1 if they want a diploma.
"That is when we begin to see that students deviate from the progress," she said. "As they go higher in math we start to see that there are some challenges."
Wright uses an equation: A = B + C.
She said the district can't improve academics if student behavior and school culture aren't at their best.
“We really want our families, our caregivers, and our guardians to really engage in what we’re doing to talk about where we are because again it takes all of us to make sure our students are getting what they need,” she said.
This was Superintendent Iranetta Wright’s first state of the schools address. She was named superintendent in February.
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