Congratulations to West Lowndes Elementary (WLE) and West Lowndes Middle (WLM) in Mississippi, which have both seen tremendous growth in improved test scores and student achievement, including big gains for economically disadvantaged students. Some of the data are highlighted below:

  • In the two years that WLE has been working with aha! Process, the percentage of third-grade students scoring Proficient or Advanced in language arts achievement on the Mississippi Curriculum Test, Second Edition (MCT2) has increased a total of 26.1%. Fourth grade has increased 35.7%, and fifth grade has increased 3.6%.
  • Third-, fourth-, and fifth-grade students at WLE have increased mathematics achievement on the MCT2 as well. Fifty percent of third-grade students scored Proficient or Advanced in 2009, compared with 81.5% in 2011, an increase of 31.5%. Similarly, fourth-grade students scoring Proficient or Advanced increased from 34.3% to 75% (40.7% increase), and fifth-grade students increased from 47.5% to 64.1% (16.6% increase).
  • Over a four-year period from 2008–2011, seventh-grade students at WLM achieved a 14.4% increase in MCT2 language arts scores. In 2008, 31.1% of seventh-grade students scored Proficient or Advanced on the MCT2. In 2011, 45% of seventh-grade students scored Proficient or Advanced.
  • Over a seven-year period from 2005–2011, seventh-grade students at WLM achieved a 34.9% increase in MCT2 mathematics scores. In 2005, 27.6% of seventh-grade students scored Proficient or Advanced on the MCT2. In 2011, 62.5% of seventh-grade students scored Proficient or Advanced.

Economically disadvantaged students at both WLE and WLM have shown significant increases in achievement since they began implementing Advance: School Improvement. Both schools have also shown improved test scores when compared to a control group. For information on the increases among economically disadvantaged students and the comparisons to the control group, please check out the full report on the data from West Lowndes on our website.

The Lowndes County School District in Mississippi has been working with aha! Process to implement Advance: School Improvement since 2006. The partnership between aha! Process and Lowndes County began at the middle school level and expanded to include the elementary schools in 2009. Teachers have been trained in A Framework for Understanding Poverty and Research-Based Strategies. In addition, through academic coaching, all teachers were trained on the nine processes and classroom applications that comprise Advance. In the academic coaching sessions, aha! Process consultants worked with teachers in small group sessions to embed the Advance processes. For more information, email us at achievement@ahaprocess.com or call Alecia Chapman at (800) 424-9484.