Rocky Creek Elementary has been identified again as a Targeted School Improvement (TSI) campus due to persistent low performance in a specific student subgroup, school staff told the George County School Board.

A school representative, identified in the meeting record as Fordell, said the campus was flagged because a subgroup of 10 or more students (special education students, in this case) scored in the bottom 5% for English language arts statewide. Fordell said the TSI designation requires 50% of that subgroup to show growth from one state test year to the next for multiple years to be removed from the TSI list.

Fordell described how the school has used targeted funding tied to school-improvement status to pay for professional development, additional teacher assistance and services that support dual-language learners who also receive special-education services. The school reported internal benchmark gains between fall checkpoints (for example, a rise in reading benchmark performance from 50% to 60% at one checkpoint and math from 42% to 50%), but noted science and other measures lag behind the school’s targets.

School leaders said Rocky Creek achieved an “A” rank on one accountability measure last year and that the school’s current accountability score is 489 points; the school’s stated target to maintain an A rating is 442 points or higher under the district’s accountability model. Fordell said Rocky Creek’s bottom 25% subgroup (the focus for growth points) represents roughly the lowest-performing students and accounts for the largest challenge in demonstrating year-to-year growth.

The presentation described enrollment and attendance patterns, chronic-absence counts and that the school’s additional staff funded through school-improvement money were being used to provide more immediate intervention and family communication.

Board members and district staff responded with congratulations for recent improvements and asked clarifying questions about benchmarks and the next state assessment window, which the district said typically runs from early April into May.

No formal action was taken; the item was presented as an informational report from the school.