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11/6/2019

Dear HMS Parents, Guardians, and Students,

As many of you are aware, and have hopefully noticed, HMS has worked very hard to make improvements over the past couple of years.   I can proudly say that we have accomplished some of our goals.  I am not just saying this, I can show our improvement with high quality comparative data that unequivocally proves that we are a great school.  I would like to add that any good coach knows that any team cannot win without great athletes, and we feel the same way at HMS. We have great students and they are the reason we have been able to accomplish several significant goals.

Before I share some of the data we have collected, I would like to clarify one item.  We receive very little high quality school-to-school data.  The only data we receive comes from State end-of-level tests: RISE for 8^th Graders, and ASPIRE for 9^th graders.  While I understand that not everyone sees the value in these tests, I want to be clear that I do see value in them.  They are not perfect assessments, but they allow us to see how we stack up against other schools in our district and state.  I do not want to overstate the importance of end-of-level testing, but from my perspective, the data we receive guides our improvement and goals.

Over the past two weeks, we have received data from the State that measures two important categories.  The first category is Median Growth Percentile (MGP). Essentially this score shows how much students at HMS grew last year in a collective way.  We do not have individual growth numbers yet, but we do have school Median Growth Percentile data for our school district.  There are six courses that we have data for: English 8, English 9, Math 8, Math 9, Science 8, and Science 9.  When comparing MGP at the six middle schools in our district, Hurricane Middle ranks first in 5 out of the 6 courses that were tested.  The second category that we received data on was Percent Proficient, which is a measurement of how many students passed the end-of-level test (with a score of 3 or 4).  HMS ranks 2^nd in one course, 3^rd in two courses, 4th in two courses, and 5^th in one course.  The most exciting data comes in the combined rank of these two important measurements, MGP and Percent Proficient.  Below is how we stack up when compared to the other five middle schools in Washington County School District:

HMS English 8 is Ranked #1                HMS English 9 is Raked #1

HMS Math 8 is Ranked #5                    HMS Math 9 is Ranked #1

HMS Science 8 is Ranked #1               HMS Science 9 is Ranked #1

I would also like to highlight the other subjects at HMS that have an end-of-level assessment that allows us to compare ourselves to other schools in the State and District.  Our Career and Technical Education (CTE) courses score very high in our district and state.  We rank in the top three schools in all tested courses (Business Office Specialist, Apparel Design, Manufacturing Technology, Fashion Design Studio, and Food and Nutrition).  This is another important indicator of our improvement.

I believe this great news comes because of phenomenal teachers, great support staff, supportive parents, motivated students, and a fantastic community.  We have great momentum at HMS and we are committed to getting better every day. 

Sincerely,

Principal Homer