Raising The Bar for Bragging

Banners Come Down At Accredited Schools

If any school in Alexandria should want to shout out its scholastic strides on an oversize banner, it's Jefferson-Houston elementary school.

Preliminary results show that the school has achieved state accreditation for the first time.

But when the question was raised recently about eliminating the blue banners used by Alexandria for years as a way to distinguish schools that met the state's requirements, Jefferson-Houston's administrators were among the first to say down with the signs.

"I feel the banners are just a symbol," Principal Kimberly Graves said. "My goal was to improve achievement at this school. While we've met the benchmark this year, we still have more work to do."

"The absence of these banners by no means minimizes what my kids have done," she added.

In 2001, only two schools in Alexandria could hang the signs boasting of their accreditation. Today, 14 of the 16 have met that standard. As a result, new Superintendent Morton Sherman brought up the matter at Leadership Academy, attended by all school administrators, and announced a few weeks ago that the banners were coming down. The school system has outgrown them, he wrote in a letter to the community.

"I would like to begin an important conversation about how we measure and celebrate success in our schools," Sherman wrote. "What achievements are 'banner-worthy?' How do we define success?"

State accreditation and federal "adequate yearly progress" status are determined by the Standards of Learning exams.

"Schools stand for so much more," Sherman said. "We are shooting much higher than minimal competency."

He said he first took note of the signs before taking his job. He and School Board members Scott Newsham and Sheryl Gorsuch were driving through the city, passing every school, when the conversation turned to the banners. Newsham said he asked Sherman what he thought and then relayed how some in the community compared the school signs to restaurants' posting notices that they met the health code.

"We need to set the bar much, much higher," Newsham said, adding that he supports Sherman's decision. "I sincerely believe we have the resources, the people, and that this should really be one of the best school systems, if not the best, in the country."

School Board President Yvonne Folkerts said she also supported the action.