Thursday was a truly happy day in Suitland as ground was broken for a new Suitland High School to replace the run down 51-year-old structure where current Prince George’s Schools CEO Monica Goldson started her career as a teacher.

“To now be able to put a shovel in the ground to make this a new facility so that students dreams can become a reality,” says Goldson, “is extra special.”

But on this day of celebration there are growing concerns about the teaching of students inside PGCPS schools.

7News On Your Side has obtained student performance numbers for the first two of three proficiency benchmarks for the just completed school year. For English across grades 3 through 10 a range of 11% to 36% of students are meeting expectations.

For math the scores decline through the grades from 38% meeting expectations in Kindergarten to 2% in 7th grade and 0% in 8th grade. For algebra 1 only 3% of students in Prince George’s County met the benchmark expectation this spring. The school system source who shared the documents says they show the system itself is failing.

CEO Monica Goldson calls the leaked numbers misleading.

“It’s only for part of the school year. It doesn’t complete the entire school yearour kids have worked extremely hard after the pandemic and during the pandemic.”

Goldson claims that hard work is helping students catch up. She says the end of the school year benchmarks show many more students meeting expectations, but she is not yet ready to share those numbers.

“We will give a full picture in September as we promised but giving an incomplete one now is irresponsible,” claims Goldson.