The York York County School Division schools met 262 of 265 achievement targets as required under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act's Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) benchmarks.

Additionally, 99.3 percent of the division's teachers are "highly qualified" under the federal law's standards.

Seventeen of the division's 18 traditional schools made AYP. Magruder Elementary School missed making AYP by one target. The division missed making AYP by two targets.

"While meeting the federal law's standards is important, our focus is on developing and implementing instructional strategies that will help all students achieve to their fullest potential," Steven R. Staples, Ed.D., YCSD superintendent, said. "Our targeted remediation programs, emphasis on teacher training to meet the needs of individual students, and the establishment of a minority task force all demonstrate the division's commitment to student achievement."

At Magruder Elementary, the division also has assigned an additional administrator to the school to provide enhanced instructional leadership. One administrator will focus on the primary grades, K-3, and the other on the upper elementary grades, 4-5. "This two-principal model worked very well at Yorktown Elementary, and we are confident that it will positively effect student achievement at Magruder," Staples said.

At the division level, a special education task force recently provided recommendations to address the overall instructional program for identified students. "We are in the beginning stages of our response to special education students as a subgroup in AYP just like most school divisions across the country. The challenge is to find ways to prevent identified disabilities from negatively impacting student performance on high-stakes accountability tests," he said. "We know this is a long-term issue that isn't solved by quick fixes.

"Our AYP data reflects an overall favorable performance, but we still have some areas to work on to raise the achievement of all students and to reach the next level as a school division," Staples said.