By CALEB FREY

Staff Reporter

LAPLACE – District Performance Scores have just been released, with St. John the Baptist Parish schools joining nearly 90 percent of all Louisiana school districts in improving their yearly scores.

St. John Parish, along with 57 other school districts, showed improvement on their DPS for the 2004-05 school year, which marks the second straight year of improvement for St. John. Only eight districts in Louisiana declined from their previous year’s scores.

The DPS is determined by a combination of individual student scores on LEAP tests, Graduation Exit Exams and the Iowa State Tests along with attendance and dropout rates.

&#8220Even though these scores measure pre-hurricane district performance, I think they are an indication of the momentum our state was experiencing in the area of the student, school and district performance,” said State Superintendent of Education Cecil J. Picard. &#8220We know that Hurricanes Katrina and Rita have created a significant bump in the road, but I believe that our districts are resilient, and they are determined to continue moving forward in the years to come, despite any obstacle,” Picard said.

School districts in Louisiana are also given DPS labels or &#8220Stars” annually, indicating their level of performance.

St. John Parish improved to 72.1 in 2005, up from 68.9 the previous year. A score of 140.0 and above equals five stars, the highest a school can receive. A score of 120-139.9 equals four stars. A score of 100-119.9 equals three stars. A DPS of 80-99.9 equals two stars and 60-70.9 equals one star. Everything below that is considered academically unacceptable.

The news of St. John School improving in their DPS came as no shock to School Board President Dr. Gerald Keller.

We’ve done a good job in staffing and professional development so I’m not surprised we improved,” Keller said. &#8220Hard work, good planning and putting key people in positions to do the job. That’s what it’s all about.”

But the teachers are only one part of the equation, according to Keller, who said that the students and parents have also worked very hard to achieve improved scores over the past couple years.

&#8220The parents have really become involved, and it helps when they push their children,” Keller said.”

Students in grades 3-11 across the state began LEAP, iLEAP and Graduation Exit Exams Monday and ends on Friday.