HWDSB Ready to Continue Work on High School Literacy
The Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) today released school and board results for the latest Grade 10 literacy test.
In spring 2015, 3,126 Grade 10 students at Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board, eligible for the first time, wrote the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test (OSSLT). Students must successfully complete the OSSLT or a related literacy course to graduate from secondary school.
In the latest results, 76% of students were successful, the same rate as 2013-14.
“We need to celebrate the achievements we’ve seen by our students and staff, but realize that we still have work to do,” Director of Education Manny Figueiredo said.
“We believe we can do better and we are committed to improving this result. We also realize that some of our students who are not successful on the OSSLT obtain this requirement through the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Course.”
Figueiredo said it is clear that educators are having a positive impact on student achievement.
EQAO does cohort tracking to follow the same students from their elementary EQAO tests to their secondary school tests. For HWDSB, they followed 2,840 students from their Grade 6 results to their results on the OSSLT in Grade 10.
There were some very encouraging trends. Of these tracked students, 14% were below the provincial standard (Level 3 or 4) in Grade 6 writing but were later successful on the Grade 10 literacy test. Meanwhile, 9% of the tracked students did not meet standard in Grade 6 reading but were successful on the OSSLT.
OSSLT measures whether or not students are meeting the minimum standard for reading and writing for understanding the Ontario Curriculum across all subjects up to the end of Grade 9. Results of the tests, developed by Ontario teachers, aid planning at the student, school, board and provincial levels. EQAO results are among the many pieces of data that Board educators use to address the learning needs of students.
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Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board is engaging the community to reimagine its vision and focus. Watch for details as the Board rolls out the Reimagine HWDSB initiative so our community can help us Explore, Imagine and Launch a new direction. Learn more at www.hwdsb.on.ca or follow us on Twitter @hwdsb.
For more information
Rob Faulkner, Communications Officer
(905) 527-5092 ext. 2377, (905) 906-2007
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BACKGROUND
Some themes in this year’s results include:
1. Sustained improvement in OSSLT participation rates, a step towards graduation.
HWDSB wants all students to graduate from secondary schools so they can achieve success in a post-secondary pathway. This is why HWDSB is encouraged by rising rates of student participation on the OSSLT.
HWDSB participation rates for the 2014-15 OSSLT remained at the five-year high of 91%, tied with the previous two years as the highest rate HWDSB has seen in five years.
Participation matters because earning an Ontario Secondary School Diploma requires that students complete the OSSLT or the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Course (OSSLC). Greater participation shows that more students are taking steps toward graduation.
It is also significant because it allows schools to learn more about students’ areas of strength and need. With detailed feedback, a teacher can develop strategies that are specific to each student. This will create the conditions for success when a student makes a second attempt at the OSSLT or when they take the OSSLC.
2. Schools Embracing Innovation
Although challenges remain, some HWDSB schools are seeing improvements.
At Sherwood – where the annual OSSLT success rate rose nine points to 76% in 2014-15 – the student participation rate also rose from 91% to 96%. Sherwood’s literacy team worked together to discover gaps among Grade 10 students who may have struggled with the OSSLT. A staff analysis found that students struggled to provide written answers that had specific, relevant supporting detail. A core team of staff developed ways to encourage this skill in the students, and had all school staff model the expectation by answering their own ‘short answer question.’ Staff were asked to embed this skill-building every subject and grade. Based on student input after the test, staff will determine the next area of focus to raise student achievement.
At Glendale – where the annual OSSLT success rate rose three points to 66% in 2014-15 – staff took a broad approach to teamwork. A team of Glendale Grade 10 teachers partnered with teachers from elementary schools that feed into Glendale. They collaborated to give specific feedback, based on student work, on the areas where students needed improvement. Staff met with colleagues to review the feedback; students then signed up for coaching sessions for these missing skills. Glendale credits this staff support and calm writing conditions as contributing to the success.
Updated on Friday, September 24, 2021.