STATE OF THE SCHOOLS

Presented by
Dr. David A. Dolph
Superintendent, Troy City Schools
April 29, 2002


Thank you for joining me for my fourth annual State of the Schools address. Fortunately, since my first address, which I delivered during the depths of our financial crisis almost exactly three years ago today, my message each succeeding year has contained a little more positive news than the previous year's. I can gladly say that the same thing holds true this year. As I evaluate where we are today and where we've come from, I am very pleased with the progress we have made in many different areas, but especially in the two highest profile areas for schools; academics and finances. I look forward to sharing our successes and future challenges with you today.

During the next few minutes, I am going to share a lot of information with you, both from an academic and financial perspective. Many times people question the integrity of statistics offered in presentations like this. Therefore, I encourage you to visit the Ohio Department of Education web site so that you can see for yourself that what I'm about to say is "out there" for all to see.

We are as solid financially and academically as we have been during my four years here in Troy. During the last three years, we have shown steady improvement in our students' academic improvements as measured by the Ohio Department of Education, and we have regained the financial stability we all expect of our schools. Our improvements have been a result of many fine people, including our students and staff, parents, and members of this community putting forth a great deal of effort and making sacrifices for the good of our students. I am convinced that the same attitude, effort, and cooperative spirit will enable us to address and conquer any challenges that confront us in the future.

I believe that every school system has two fundamental responsibilities to its constituents. The first is obviously to provide a quality education to its young people, preparing them to succeed in the real world. Second is to be fiscally prudent with your money. Stated simply, it is our responsibility to provide the strongest and most comprehensive educational program possible at a reasonable cost to you, the taxpayers of Troy. According to the most recent data from the Ohio Department of Education, we have certainly improved in both of these areas and in fact are achieving success in them.

Since our primary responsibility is educating young people, let me begin there. There is much debate about the quality of education students in Troy, as well as in public schools around the country, are getting. I am confident that Troy students who are truly interested in receiving a quality education can get one in our schools.

For example, last year, one in five Troy graduates earned an honors diploma based on their academic accomplishments. More than half of last year's seniors also earned $500 in scholarship money for their performance on the twelfth grade proficiency tests. Troy's 2001 seniors also ranked at or near the top of the county schools in the percentage of students earning honors scores on the twelfth grade proficiency tests. According to the ACT High School Profile, Troy students regularly exceed state and national averages on the ACT College Entrance Exam. Our second graders perform extremely well on the IOWA Tests of Basic Skills, consistently scoring above the 70th%ile. This year, our second grades exceeded their predicted ability by an average of 16%ile across the district. This is indicative of the high level of instruction going on in our elementary schools.

In addition to proficiency, IOWA, and college board test results, Troy students also are award winners for outstanding performance on state and national academic tests like the National Latin Exam, the American Invitational Mathematics Exam, and the Ohio Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the American Mathematics Competition tests. Approximately 50 Troy High School students are currently attending college and high school simultaneously through our post-secondary option program, getting a head start on their college careers. Year in and year out, Troy graduates are accepted in and enjoy success at top-notch universities around the country.

The fact is that our academic results on the 2002 Ohio Department of Education Report Card are the best they have ever been as a district. Our students' performance improved in two-thirds of the state's academic indicators and we achieved more overall state academic standards than ever before. Our academic improvement has been steady over these past three years.

However, we do have room for improvement. For example, our graduation percentage is not as high as we want it to be. As a result, we have implemented two intervention programs at the high school known as the Access and Passage programs. The sole purpose for their implementation is to assist those students who have experienced difficulties earning the credits necessary and to help them earn a high school diploma.

We are also concerned that our fourth and sixth grade students are not performing as well as we want them to on the state proficiency tests. One look at the state results indicate that we are not alone with this concern. To be honest, it is hard to reconcile proficiency test results with the information I just shared with you from our IOWA Tests results. But the fact is that proficiency test results are more widely publicized by the state, and we expect to improve our performance at the elementary levels on them.

In our efforts to improve, at all six elementary schools, we implemented during this school year stringent intervention programs for students who were not successful on the proficiency tests. Teachers and students have worked individually or in small groups, often before or after school, to address weaknesses in academic skills. We have been very pleased with the dedication of students, parents, and staff alike in our efforts to improve achievement at the elementary level, and we are hopeful that they pay off in improved results on this year's tests. When the latest test results are received, we will once again evaluate them and improve our intervention strategies in our continued efforts to enable all of our students to be successful.

So, be assured that while we are overall pleased with our students' performance, we also recognize that there is still improvement to be made, and we are not just hoping it will happen. We have developed and implemented very specific intervention strategies that we feel will benefit those students who have not yet been as successful as they need to be.

The beauty of a public educational system like ours is the diversity of students whose needs we must meet. We realize that not all Troy students are interested in university life. Some wish to attend technical schools, others opt for military life, while still others prefer starting their work careers immediately after graduation. It is our duty to offer a quality education to students with such diverse goals, and this is something we have been working hard at improving. One of the results of this heightened awareness has been to develop a better relationship with the Upper Valley JVS to make sure that students whose areas of interest are more technical in nature are directed to the appropriate programs there.

In addition to offering a strong academic program to our students, Trojans have also made it very clear that they expect us to offer strong extra and co-curricular programs to our students. As an example of how we are responding to this charge, Troy High School and Troy Junior High students have participated in more than 1500 extra or co-curricular activities this year. Troy art students have had their work displayed in the Dayton Art Institute, the Troy band performed in London, England on New Year's Day, the band, orchestra, and choir have all competed and performed well in state competitions, thespians prepare for and produce plays that showcase outstanding acting and musical skills, our athletic programs have a long and rich history of success, and our students participate in service organizations as a way of learning about community involvement. In addition to providing these educational opportunities to our students, we also place a heavy emphasis on character education; teaching our young people about ethics, compassion, and volunteerism. In other words, our role in educating our students goes well beyond proficiency tests and college entrance exams.

We take very seriously our task of providing the best quality programs possible while prudently spending taxpayer dollars. This is not an easy task, but one that we are achieving. Ohio Department of Education data shows that last year we spent nearly $1000 per pupil less than the state average to educate our students. Factoring in our student population, this means that we spent approximately $4.4 million less than the state average educating our students. Considering the successes I have just described, both academically and in the extra and co-curricular realms, it is obvious that the citizens of Troy are receiving a good return on their educational investment.

One could easily argue that a district with a motto that says, "In Pursuit of Excellence" should not be satisfied merely with improvement, that we should be striving to be the best. We, too, believe in striving for excellence. But, as I stated before, we have a duty not only to our students to provide quality programs, but to you as taxpayers to be prudent with your tax dollars.

We have studied the seventy-one districts around the state that earned an Excellent rating in an effort to see what we can do to move towards that category. What we found was rather telling.

While Excellent districts do indeed perform better than we do on the state report card, the fact is that the average expenditure for Excellent districts is nearly $1400 per student greater than we spend here in Troy. That amounts to nearly $6 million per year difference, which equates to approximately 10 mills of additional taxes. It is also important to note that of these seventy-one Excellent districts, almost 80% were in a deficit spending mode last year; something that we are working very hard at avoiding.

So, while we do indeed believe in pursuing excellence, we also feel a responsibility to our local voters to control costs as much as possible. It is a challenging balancing act to efficiently manage our money while providing the programs our constituents expect us to offer our students. We feel that we have done a good job of that, but this points to the importance of keeping our funding at its current levels. This is why the 4.5 mill renewal on the May 7th ballot is essential to our continued academic and financial success. With the latest DeRolph school funding decision once again going nowhere, it is obvious that the state considers school support primarily a local responsibility. So, while we do indeed operate in a fiscally responsible manner compared to most districts, we simply cannot operate without the approximately $2.7 million annually this levy generates. We have no choice but to approve this levy to remain healthy and to continue the gains we have achieved during the last four years.

So, according to the state report card, we have shown steady academic improvement while spending less money than most districts spend. We're batting a thousand on the two most important areas facing our schools.

Our financial and academic improvement hasn't been by accident. Three years ago, with input from Troy citizens, we developed a comprehensive five-year strategic plan. This plan addresses the previously mentioned curricular and financial areas in addition to communication and facilities issues. Unlike many such plans, it has not been developed, then placed on a shelf only to be revisited when it's time to change our goals and strategies. We refer to it constantly. It drives the decisions we make, and implementing the strategies developed for it has been instrumental in our financial recovery and our academic improvement. It is a living, breathing plan that will assist us in dealing with our future challenges.

One of these challenges concerns the facilities that make up the Troy City Schools. You may have noticed that area districts are addressing facility concerns by building new schools, in some cases using money provided by the state of Ohio. Bradford has just moved into a new high school, paid for in large part by state funds. Comparatively speaking, Piqua has a relatively new high school and a new junior high. Tipp City is currently building a new high school. Miami East is undertaking a huge, district-wide building project, counting on state funds to assist in this project. The state has made facility improvement a high priority. Unfortunately, unlike many districts such as Bradford, the promise of state funds to support building projects for the Troy schools is years in our future.

But, despite the fact help from the state is not imminent, we have not been idly sitting by while other districts move in the area of facilities. We have utilized, at no cost to the district, state-approved architects to study our facilities and make recommendations for improvement. As with most districts, their recommendations have been sweeping in nature, and our task is to decide how best to respond to them. For this, we will once again be calling on members of our community for your assistance because any decision we make could have huge academic and financial implications.

We have no choice but to study this issue. To do otherwise would be irresponsible. Our district is comprised of more than $65 million in facilities, and it is our duty to think thirty, forty, fifty years down the road, just as our predecessors did to provide for the students of today. Our newest building, the junior high, is now thirty years old and the rest of our buildings are forty years old and older. By all accounts, thanks to the taxpayers approving permanent improvement levies, and diligence on our part, we have been able to maintain them remarkably well. However, the fact remains that they are aging all the time. Therefore, one of the challenges facing us in the coming months is to assess where we currently are with facilities and what we need to do to provide for the children who will be attending the Troy schools in the future. Stay tuned as we work to address this rather significant challenge.

So, in summary;

Rest assured, Troy students are indeed receiving a quality education in your schools, and we commit to you to do our best to ensure that this continues.


View: 2001 Address