Sue Hagen, the district's multilingual learner coordinator, told the Worthington Public School District Board at the Oct. regular meeting that District 518's multilingual learners averaged 52.8% of the way to their state-set ‘‘path to proficiency' targets on the ACCESS assessment this year, above the state average.

Under the Every Student Succeeds Act, Minnesota uses ACCESS scores to set individualized targets for students learning English. "This data is published in the North Star progress toward English language proficiency report," Hagen said. "On average, district 518 English learners made it 52.8% of the way to their target, which is 6.6 higher than the state average."

Hagen said 33.5% of the district's English learners met or exceeded their targets this year, also above the state average, and that 100 students exited the English-language instruction program in the previous year. She reported 1,215 current multilingual learners and 770 former English learners in the district.

Hagen described classroom practices the district credits for the results: providing comprehensible, grade-level content, co-teaching models, targeted professional development and data conversations with teachers and students. "We are providing our students comprehensible grade-level content," Hagen said. "We also provide professional development on using appropriate teaching strategies and teaching methods that are effective."

Board members asked how the data are used locally. Hagen said individual schools incorporate ACCESS targets into their School Improvement Plans and that EL teachers use student composite and domain scores (listening, speaking, reading, writing) to target instruction.

The board did not take action on the presentation; members asked questions about staffing, access to data and how supports will be preserved in future budgets.