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Perkiomen Valley trustees review equity data; board debates whether presented measures show disproportionality
Summary
Administrators presented discipline, course enrollment and subgroup proficiency data required under Policy 8.32 and agreed to provide grade‑level baselines and sensitivity analyses after board members questioned whether counts reflect unique students or incidents.
District administrators presented the board with a range of equity and opportunity indicators from the 2023–24 school year and earlier data: discipline incident counts entered into the SWIS system, enrollment in honors and AP courses, English learner trends and gifted identification, and extracurricular participation by subgroup.
Dr. Kevin Clune (data lead) and Superintendent Dr. Bryan Russell explained the purpose of the equity reporting required under Policy 8.32 and said administrators were sharing top‑line trend information while principals received building‑level disaggregations for local follow up.
The discipline slides showed infractions by race and gender using counts pulled from the SWIS entry system; a board member asked whether the figures reflected incidents or unique students. Administrators confirmed the numbers were counts of infractions, not distinct students, and said they would follow up with disproportionality analyses to compare incident counts to subgroup population baselines by grade.
Board members pressed for context and sensitivity testing: several said small absolute numbers in course‑level subgroup comparisons (for example, honors biology versus general biology) can create large swings in percentages and that baseline demographics by grade are needed to interpret under‑ or over‑representation. "If there's only 3% of all students in tenth grade who are Black, then that's representative," one board member said; administrators agreed to provide grade‑level baselines and sensitivity analysis.
Administrators noted a pattern the high school has tracked for several years: fewer female students enroll in some STEM courses and AP engineering/physics pathways. Board members and staff described student clubs and outreach (including a Women in STEM club) intended to lower barriers to entry and increase participation; counselors and building leaders will continue outreach and consider classroom‑level interventions such as shadow days.
The district also presented opportunity measures showing that Perkiomen Valley educates a higher share of special education students in general education settings (82% of the time or more) than the state average (about 62%). District staff said overall special education identification remains slightly below the state rate but continues to increase, and that the district is expanding co‑teaching and transition programs with consultation from the Montgomery County Intermediate Unit (MCIU). Administrators said they will finalize a co‑teaching action plan this summer and bring more disaggregated analyses back to the board.
Board members asked for further disaggregation by grade and building, sensitivity testing for small subgroups, and explicit baselines for all subgroup comparisons. Administration committed to supplying those materials and incorporating survey findings into the equity action plan.
