Evangeline Parish School Board discusses new scores, PARCC assessment

The Evangeline Parish School Board heard from Superintendent Toni Hamlin Wednesday night, November 5, regarding the recent release of school and district performance scores.
Hamlin expressed how happy she and all of her staff are with the improvements made by Evangeline Parish schools thanks to principals, teachers and students. Hamlin said she was thrilled to report to the board that the district performance score increased from a C to a B grade or a 76.6 to an 88.7.
In other business, the board discussed this year’s end of course testing. Hamlin stated that third and eighth graders will still test with paper and pencil this year instead of online testing. This was a decision made at the state level after the department of education realized school districts would not have the necessary infrastructure in place to conduct all testing online. However, Hamlin stated high school testing will be done online using PARCC.
The board’s attorney, Robert Hammonds, reported that the governor and department of education Superintendent John White, who are in disagreement over the use of PARCC (White is for it and Governor Jindal is not) are still fighting each other over its use. However, Hammonds said courts up to this point have all sided with White in this matter. However, this case, and others like it, have not yet gone to appeals courts. For this year, PARCC testing will be occurring near the end of the school year.
In other business, the school district collected $657,930.14 in sales/use taxes in October, compared to $611,015.27 in October of last year.