Katie Glenweber, the district’s new curriculum supervisor, told the Riverside Local Board of Education the district earned a 3.5-star overall rating on the state’s 2025 report card and remained “very similar” to last year on the performance index.

The rating reflected four stars in achievement, gap closing and graduation; three stars in early literacy; two stars in progress; and mixed building-level results, with Riverview and Mel Ridge scoring four stars and Buckeye and Parkside scoring four and a half stars, Glenweber said.

Why it matters: the state report card determines how the district measures up on student achievement, growth and several other metrics used by families, staff and state education officials. Board members and staff said the results will guide curriculum choices, interventions and longer-term facility and program planning.

Glenweber, who led the presentation, said the district’s performance index was 90.2 this year (90.5 last year) and that the district’s performance-index percentage is calculated against the top 2% of schools statewide. “Achievement in a nutshell is how our students are performing on the OSTs,” she said, referring to Ohio State Tests. She explained the state’s weighting system and how subject-accelerated students can affect reported measures.

On progress — the report card’s multi-year measure of growth — Glenweber said Riverside’s score was weakest. Progress is calculated as a composite of up to three years of data, with the most recent year weighted at 50% and the prior two years at 25% each. “It is a three-year composite,” she said. “That’s why it’s the hardest to come out of.” She added that subject acceleration can remove students from the grade-to-grade progress model and lower measured progress for a cohort.

Staff described actions the district is taking. Those include adopting new reading and math curricula (Glenweber named the kindergarten–grade 2 ELA program “Wit and Wisdom” and a math curriculum identified as CPM), forming personalized-learning cohorts for staff, expanding gifted credentialing, strengthening MTSS (Multi-Tiered System of Supports) and using data dashboards provided through the Educational Service Center or EFC of Northeast Ohio to track standards, released test items and subgroup performance.

Glenweber demonstrated dashboards that break performance down standard by standard and link to released state-test questions for classroom use. She said the dashboards pull data from the district’s EMIS and state sources so the district sees the same data the state receives.

Early literacy and third-grade reading: the report card’s early-literacy component combines third-grade proficiency, promotion to fourth grade and K–3 improvement. Glenweber said Riverside has strong third-grade proficiency and that the district is focused on reducing the number of students identified as “off track” in K–3 diagnostics. “By far, the most confusing measure on the report,” she added of the K–3 improvement calculation, which follows only students who are off track and measures whether they move on track in the following year.

Attendance: chronic absenteeism was cited as a district weakness. Glenweber said the district’s chronic-absence rate was 22.9%, above the state target of 16.4%, and that the district is examining causes including family travel, sports and extracurricular conflicts, medical and dental appointments, and coding or reporting issues. She said the district has created a chronic-absence dashboard to identify students and patterns and will convene targeted conversations with families and students.

Graduation and college-career readiness: the district’s combined four- and five-year graduation metric was reported at 95.2%, with a four-year rate of 96.6% and five-year rate of 93.1%. Glenweber said the district is pursuing more embedded credentials, expanded dual-enrollment opportunities with Lakeland and a senior capstone to increase work-based-learning hours that count toward the state’s readiness measures.

What’s next: Glenweber and district staff said they will continue to use dashboards, targeted interventions, fidelity checks on curriculum implementation and professional learning for teachers. Board members asked for follow-up details, including counts of students “on track” vs. “off track” in K–3 and a timeline for when curricular changes are expected to produce measurable results.

Glenweber said some curricular impacts typically appear in a second year of implementation for math and that the district expected to see gains as new programs cycle through more grade levels.