<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=1FZHK2_1GpqIgPN00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=1FZHK2_1GpqIgPN00" width="1200" height="448" ><figcaption>Albemarle County school SPSF ratings; schools listed in lighter color were moved down one level because of subgroup underperformance.Courtesy Albemarle County.</figcaption></figure><p>In October, the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) released its School Performance and Support Framework (SPSF) rating for every school in the state, and western Albemarle’s schools once again showed strong results. Brownsville, Ivy, and Murray Elementary schools along with Henley Middle were all rated in the (highest) “Distinguished” category under the state’s grading system that assigns points for various levels of student achievement. Western Albemarle High and Crozet Elementary rated as “Meets Expectations” (the new name for the second highest category).</p><p>A host of changes are planned or in progress for the SPSF rating system. The framework was designed and put in place by the state board over the past several years under the prior administration, and new board members appointed earlier this year by the Governor’s office have moved to put their stamp on it. As a first step, the VDOE replaced the names of two of the rating categories with more abstract monikers, replacing last year’s On Track with “Meets Expectations,” and Off Track with “Approaching Expectations.” The state board said that the old terms “implied an inaccurate trajectory” and that the term Off Track was stigmatizing. None of Albemarle’s schools fell into the fourth (lowest) “Needs Improvement” camp.</p><h2>Growth mindset</h2><p>The SPSF rating is a combination of points schools earn through “mastery” of grade-level material (driven by Standards of Learning [SOL] pass rates), “growth” in student knowledge over the school year, and “readiness” for the next level as evidenced by attendance, advanced coursework and graduation rates. Some of the board’s changes, such as a new “growth calculation, have resulted in less-than-useful comparisons between last year and this year’s results. While growth last year was measured as a student’s improvement as compared to a statistical prediction based on their past performance, this year it was calculated as the student’s movement along a range of levels of content mastery called a value table.</p><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=2sXlMw_1GpqIgPN00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=2sXlMw_1GpqIgPN00" width="1200" height="935" ><figcaption>Table showing multi-year increase in SOL “cut scores” needed to pass, with a “pass/approaching” category to gradually roll in the new scores. Courtesy VDOE.</figcaption></figure><p>Under the new system, schools can earn “growth” points not only when students move to a higher level such as from basic to proficient, but also when already-proficient students stay right where they are. The VDOE acknowledged the tradeoff—while the value tables are easier to explain to families, they’re more closely associated with mastery as they reward how well students were already performing.</p><p>The weighting of the various SPSF components had been a past point of emphasis among state board members who argued that prioritizing mastery better prepared students for graduation and life, and was consistent with division goals of reducing achievement gaps. Now the board is considering changing the growth proportion substantially next year, so that it is equally weighted with mastery. For example, in elementary schools it would mean a change from a weighting of 65% mastery/25% growth in the SPSF score, to 45% for each next year.</p><h2>Federal support</h2><p>Another complicating factor in understanding school ratings is a federal system of financial support for under-performing schools called Targeted Support &amp; Improvement (TSI). This system is based on “subgroups” of students with as few as 15 members in a school, such as those with disabilities or economic disadvantage and groups based on race or ethnicity. Each year the state sets thresholds for SPSF performance for these subgroups, and if a school has any group that performs below the thresholds, that school is automatically dropped down one level in the SPSF ratings and receives federal TSI support funding. The intent is to prevent an otherwise high-performing school from hiding or ignoring problems within small subgroups.</p><p>Two schools in the Crozet area, Western Albemarle High and Crozet Elementary, were dropped from Distinguished to Meets Expectations solely due to their Students with Disabilities subgroup underperformance during 2025-26, though they both scored strongly in all other areas. Statewide there was a 78% increase in the number of schools receiving a TSI designation, from 343 to 609 schools, but VDOE officials have not presented a clear explanation for the jump. The thresholds for measuring subgroup performance (which are recalculated each year) were sharply higher in 2026, pushing 98 high schools into TSI status, where last year that number was zero.</p><p>The county as a whole fared about the same as last year, with eight schools rated Distinguished, eight as Meets Expectations, and seven as Approaching Expectations. As school division officials pointed out, of the division’s 23 schools that receive SPSF scores, 11 were downgraded due to the TSI designation, and almost all of those were flagged for lower performance in the Students with Disabilities grouping. So now, as a byproduct of the VDOE’s changes, it’s possible for a school to improve academically but still receive a TSI designation because the statewide TSI threshold rose faster than its struggling students could improve.</p><h2>A cut above</h2><p>Another assessment wrinkle lies ahead, as the state board has approved raising SOL “cut scores” (the score needed to pass an SOL test) to better align with national benchmarks like the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Virginia has one of the nation’s highest “honesty gaps”—the difference between the percentage of students who score as proficient on local standardized tests versus the (much lower) percentage who are proficient on NAEP assessments. For example, in 2024 the state’s proficiency gap was 42 points in fourth grade reading: 73% passed the SOL but only 31% were proficient on the NAEP.</p><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=1WMK8Q_1GpqIgPN00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=1WMK8Q_1GpqIgPN00" width="1200" height="675" ><figcaption>Virginia School Performance and Support Framework (SPSF) point range designations. Graphic courtesy VDOE</figcaption></figure><p>A passing score on Virginia SOL tests has been measured as 400 out of a possible 600 points for many years across most subjects, and the planned boost is significant. As an example of the cut score changes, for sixth graders the new pass/proficient SOL reading score will be 449, and for math it will be 433. These jumps will be phased in over four years, so this coming spring SOL reading tests will add a “pass/approaching” category that uses a range of 413-448 to be counted as passing, in a step toward the final levels in place by 2029-30.</p><p>Chris Gilman, the division’s Director of Accountability and Research, summed up the staff’s takeaway from the data as a “shift in mindset.” He said that “growth follows mastery,” and therefore from now on the division will “1) focus on mastery, 2) get as many students to mastery as possible, 3) measure students’ learning to grade-level standards, and 4) align teaching to grade-level standards.” Gilman did not describe how this approach differs from ACPS’s current strategy.</p><p>The board had almost no questions, as it had previously discussed the results at length. “Thank you for this review, and just to remind or let folks know, we had a pretty in-depth three-hour session on all of this two weeks ago,” said board member Judy Le. She was referring to the board’s discussion at an October 9 School Board and Superintendent’s Cabinet retreat, for which there is no publicly available video or audio recording.</p></div></body>

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In October, the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) released its School Performance and Support Framework (SPSF) rating for every school in the state, and western Albemarle’s schools once again showed strong results. Brownsville, Ivy, and Murray Elementary schools along with Henley Middle were all rated in the (highest) “Distinguished” category under the state’s grading system that assigns points for various levels of student achievement. Western Albemarle High and Crozet Elementary rated as “Meets Expectations” (the new name for the second highest category).

Crozet Area Schools Get High Marks Amid Changes

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In October, the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) released its School Performance and Support Framework (SPSF) rating for every school in the state, 

Crozet Area Schools Get High Marks Amid Changes

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