THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, October 19, 1994 TAG: 9410180107
SECTION: ISLE OF WIGHT CITIZEN PAGE: 04 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LINDA MCNATT, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ISLE OF WIGHT LENGTH: Short : 48 lines
Local public schools will have accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools by the end of the year, Superintendent Jane T. York told the School Board last Thursday.
After months of work by the local schools - evaluations, self-study, examinations and establishing school improvement plans - SACS representatives visited last week to see if the Isle of Wight County schools meet the association's accreditation criteria.
And the news was good, York said. The evaluation team, comprising educators from across the state, overwhelmingly agreed the local schools made the grade.
``It is a proud day in Isle of Wight County,'' York said. ``Without exception, each of the SACS visiting committee members has recommended that the eight Isle of Wight schools be considered for accreditation by the association.''
The association is expected to vote on the accreditation at its annual meeting in December, York said.
The county's schools are accredited by the Virginia Education Department, but they have never had SACS accreditation.
The eight local public schools will join about 90 percent of the high schools in the state and about 60 percent of the elementary and middle schools that are accredited by SACS, York said.
But Isle of Wight County was one of the first school systems in the nation to go through SACS' new evaluation process for the association's excellence-in-education standards.
The new process uses effective school research to measure improvement. Key school leaders here have been invited to discuss the process and make a presentation at a national educational conference in December.
Preparing for the evaluation over the past 18 months, local schools have been involved in self-study, Dr. Flora C. Roberts, coordinator for elementary schools, said.
Schools developed community profiles, gathered information from student achievement data and examined instructional and organizational practices in order to create school improvement plans, Roberts said. Faculties worked together to establish measures to evaluate the success of those plans. by CNB