Proud Home of the Bruins

Blackford County Schools Community,

Recently, the Indiana State Board of Education approved the 2017–18 school letter grades, and schools across our district performed very well. Letter grades are based on ISTEP scores, student growth, and at the high school level, graduation rate and college readiness. College readiness means completing college dual-credit while in high school, or by earning a state-approved technical certification in a career area.

Southside Elementary showed a two-letter grade increase from 2016–17, improving from a “C” school to an “A” school. Northside also improved their 2016–17 grade from a “B” to an “A”. In fact, the performance and growth at Northside earned a letter grade score of 97.4 out of 100, an extremely high mark! Blackford Junior High School also improved from a “D” rating in 2016–17 to a “C” rating last year. Blackford High School and Montpelier Elementary both earned “B” ratings, maintaining their status from the previous year. Blackford County Schools' overall district rating is a “B”.

In reviewing the report, we saw an increasing trend of student performance on ISTEP+, with one very impressive data point being our 6th-grade math scores with 84.1% of the students passing. This performance is the seventh highest of any school district in the state!

While we celebrate these gains and the performance on the state measures, we continually focus on ways to improve in all areas. We fully believe that test scores are just one measure of student achievement and not the complete picture. However, we want to assure that we prepare our students to be successful in this area. Congratulations to the students, teachers, and staff on the improvements.

Sincerely,

Chad Yencer
Superintendent of Schools