Students in Hermosa Beach’s two public schools improved on last year’s statewide testing marks, according to the latest standardized performance results released this week.
The scores of View and Valley students continued to increase in the Academic Performance Index, or API, which is the state Department of Education’s main measure of how schools are performing.
Students at the second-through-eighth grade Hermosa Valley School earned 941 out of a possible 1,000 points on the index, improving over last year’s score of 938.
Students at the kindergarten-through-second grade Hermosa View School scored 961 out of 1,000 on the index, an improvement over last year’s score of 953.
The state standard for acceptable performance is a score of 800.
“The Hermosa schools are doing great,” said Tina Jung, information officer for the California Department of Education.
Both schools made their API growth targets, according to the report. The API is measured year-to-year to gauge improvement. Where schools ranks as compared to other public schools with similar demographics is released by the Department of Education in the spring.
Both Hermosa schools ranked in the top ten percent of similar schools last school year.
All students were tested in English-language arts, mathematics, science, and history.
In a separate federal measure, View schools met all nine goals recorded in an Adequate Yearly Progress Report. Valley met 11 of 13 goals.
The Department of Education is de-emphasizing the federal educational standards, believing they are not as accurate a measurement of achievement as the state standards.
“We believe the federal system to be a flawed system,” Jung said.
