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(MDJ Staff/Laura Moon)

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MARIETTA — School officials from both Cobb and Marietta said they are pleased with the school-by-school Criterion-Referenced Competency Test scores that were released by the Georgia Department of Education on Thursday.

View Scores 

3rd Grade

5th Grade

8th Grade

Students in third, fifth and eighth grades must pass the reading test to advance to the next grade, and fifth- and eighth-graders must also pass the math portion. Students who fail, however, are given opportunities for re-tests and remediation. Students were tested in April and the scores released Thursday morning do not include the re-test scores.

For these three grade levels, Cobb County Schools students in 67 elementary schools and 27 middle schools were tested in reading, English/language arts, mathematics, science and social studies. In Marietta City Schools, students in eight elementary schools and one middle school were tested.

In reviewing the scores for Cobb, a number of elementary and middle schools faired well on the reading and math portions of the test, however Riverside Intermediate third-graders and Imagine Mableton eighth-graders noticeably had the smallest percentage of students meet or exceed the standards in these subject areas.

Imagine Mableton closed in late May after the Cobb school board turned down its renewal charter.

Cobb Superintendent Dr. Michael Hinojosa was unavailable for comment on Thursday but Chief Academic Officer Dr. Judi Jones, who received the scores Tuesday, said she was happy with the results despite the district losing two instructional days last school year and teachers working with increased class sizes.

“Our scores are looking pretty good,” she said. “Third grade science is the only area where we lost a little ground. It speaks to the strength of our teaching force and their commitment to the kids.”

Jones said they saw a 1 percent drop in improvement in that science compared to 2011 CRCT scores.

During next Thursday night’s board meeting, Jones said she would make a presentation to the board and review some of the data she’s had an opportunity to look over in depth.

“It will be a board overview of this … where it puts us right now, especially as we’re getting ready to rework the Strategic Plan,” she said.

When asked about Riverside Intermediate’s scores at an initial glance, Jones pointed out that this elementary school is one of the five schools in the district identified by the state last spring as a “focus” school using the new state waiver for No Child Left Behind.

The other schools include Hayes, Sanders and Brumby elementary schools and East Cobb Middle.

Cobb School Board Chair Scott Sweeney said the 2012 scores are “impressive.”

“At the fifth, seventh and eighth grade levels, the district had scale score improvements in four of five subject categories compared to last year,” he said. “At the third, fourth and sixth grade levels, scale scores improved in three of five subject categories compared to last year. I look forward to hearing Dr. Jones report on the 2012 school year CRCT test data at the board’s meeting next Thursday.”

In third-grade reading, 100 percent of the students tested in nine elementary schools met or exceeded the standards. These schools are Tritt, Keheley, Shallowford Falls, Ford, Davis, Nicholson, Timber Ridge, Brown and Due West.

The schools that did the worst were Riverside Intermediate, which had 75 percent of students meet or exceed the standards, and Norton Park, which had 81 percent of students meet or exceed the standards.

There weren’t any schools in Cobb where 100 percent of third-graders met or exceeded the standards in math, but Due West and Tritt elementary schools came close, both with 99 percent. Compton Elementary with 62 percent and Riverside Intermediate with 64 percent had the least number of students meet that goal.

Fifth-graders at Tritt, Garrison, Keheley, Ford, Kennesaw Charter, Rocky Mount, Davis, Timber Ridge and Due West elementary schools are where 100 percent of the students tested met or exceeded the goals in reading.

The fifth-graders who had the least percentage of students meet or exceed the standards in reading were at Sanders Elementary with 78 percent and Brumby Elementary with 82 percent.

In math, only the fifth-graders at Rocky Mount met or exceeded the standards by 100 percent, followed closely behind by Ford, Tritt, Kemp and Mount Bethel elementary schools, all with 99 percent.

The schools with the smallest percentage of students to meet or exceed standards were Sky View Elementary with 73 percent and Brumby Elementary with 74 percent. Due to south Cobb redistricting, Sky View closed in late May.

In eighth grade, three middle schools met or exceeded the standards by 100 percent in reading. These schools were Mabry, Dickerson and Hightower Trail. The schools that had the lowest percentage of students meet this goal were Imagine Mableton with 91 percent and Lindley and Smitha middle schools, both with 94 percent.

For math, the largest percentage of eight grade students to meet or exceed the standards were tested at Dickerson with 98 percent and Mabry with 97 percent. The two schools that had the fewest number meet that goal were students at Imagine Mableton with 40 percent and Garrett Middle with 60 percent.

For Marietta City Schools, Marietta Center for Advanced Academics (MCAA) third-and fifth-graders had the largest percentage of students meet or exceed the standards by 100 percent in all five subject areas, compared to Park Street Elementary whose third-graders had the smallest percentage of students do so.

Marietta Superintendent Dr. Emily Lembeck was out of town Thursday but the district’s Associate Superintendent Dayton Hibbs said the district is “very pleased” with this year’s CRCT scores and the number of students exceeding the standards.

Hibbs said the district has seen a substantial increase in the percentage of students exceeding the standards since it started tracking the progress in 2006, moving from 34.3 percent to 55.6.

“It’s our goal each year to increase … last year we were at 50.7 percent,” he said. “It’s a significant increase (this year) and we’re very pleased with that.”

Hibbs said their continuous improvement in the scores are due to the “outstanding” teaching staff and administrators they have in Marietta Schools.

“They certainly do a great job at increasing achievement,” he said. “We’re very excited about our students exceeding standards and a lot of praise goes out to our teachers and administrators.”

In response to the areas where they may need improvement, Hibbs said the district staff and principals would be reviewing that over the next few weeks. During the August and September school board meetings, they will talk about where they excelled and where there is a need for improvement.

For third grade, MCAA students who took the reading test met or exceeded the standards by 100 percent, followed by Burruss Elementary with 94 percent.

The two schools that had the least number of students meet or exceed the standards attend Park Street with 81 percent and Sawyer Road with 84 percent.

In math, the schools that performed the best in third grade were MCAA with 99 percent of students meeting or exceeding the standard and Burruss Elementary with 97 percent. The schools that had the least percentage of students meet or exceed the standards were Park Street Elementary with 74 percent and Lockheed Elementary with 76 percent.

In the fifth grade, 100 percent of students at MCAA met or exceeded the standard in reading and West Side Elementary had 97 percent. The schools that had the smallest percentage of students meet the goal were fifth-graders at Park Street with 85 percent and Hickory Hills with 92 percent.

For the math portion of the test, fifth-graders at MCAA performed the best with 98 percent of students meeting or exceeding the standards followed by West Side Elementary with 95 percent.

The two schools where the smallest percentage of fifth-grade students met or exceeded the standards in math attend Lockheed, 68 percent, and Park Street, 69 percent.

At Marietta Middle School, 96 percent of eighth-graders met or exceeded the standards in reading and 73 percent met that goal in math.