Northfield board hears 2024-25 CACR results and adopts stretch targets for 2025-26 and ANI 2025-28

The Northfield Board of Education held a public hearing Nov. 10 during which district staffer Daryl reviewed the district's 2024-25 Comprehensive Achievement and Civic Readiness (CACR) results and presented proposed CACR goals for 2025-26 and Achievement and Integration (ANI) targets for 2025-28. The hearing included data on kindergarten readiness, attendance-based measures used to track racial and economic gaps, on-track graduation indicators and several ANI outcomes.

Daryl said the district met several 2024-25 goals and made notable progress on others. “Eighty-five percent of kindergarten students met the grade-level benchmark,” he told the board, referring to FastBridge assessment results, and said the district met that year's kindergarten-readiness target. He also highlighted gains in attendance and narrowed gaps: FRP attendance rose from 70% to 78%, shrinking a recorded achievement gap from 15% to 7%, and student-of-color attendance increased from 74% to 80%, narrowing a 9% gap to 5%.

The presentation summarized results across five CACR focus areas: early learning (kindergarten readiness), closing racial and economic achievement gaps (measured by attendance in 2024-25), readiness for career and college, four-year graduation rates, and preparing students as lifelong learners. On graduation, Daryl reported the district's 2024 four-year graduation rates as 88% for the district's public schools and 95% for Northfield High School; he provided a breakdown of the 44 students who did not graduate in 2024, noting 25% remained in an 18'21 program, 30% graduated the following year (missed the cutoff by a month or two), and 27% were still continuing.

Daryl reviewed ANI results from the 2022'25 cycle and new ANI targets for 2025'28. He said ANI Goal 1 (reduce the share of grades 9'12 FRP students who are credit-deficient within four years) improved from a 27% baseline to 12%, beating the 13% target. He also reported that the percentage of FRP third-graders proficient in reading rose from a baseline of 28% to 51% in 2023-24, exceeding the 40% goal. By contrast, ANI Goal 2 (reduce D/F rates for FRP middle-school students from 31% to 9%) was not met; the district reduced that measure to 18% and noted further ANI improvement funding could be redirected as a result.

Looking ahead, Daryl said the district's 2025-26 CACR goals use an "80/90/100" framework and include new, more specific targets: a kindergarten growth target requiring a half-point growth per week from fall to spring on FastBridge benchmarks for all kindergarten students; a 90% attendance target for all students with every student improving attendance; continuing 95% on-track cohort targets for grades 9'11 with explicit recognition of students who take longer than four years to graduate; and moving the career/college readiness milestone from eighth grade to 11th grade. For ANI 2025'28, the district set a target to reduce the FRP credit-deficiency gap from 12% to 6% and outlined strategies including a success coach at Northfield High School, an educational assistant at the middle school working through MTSS, ALC counselor support, Minnesota Reading Corps support, an internal literacy coach, family navigators and preschool educational assistants.

The public hearing did not include extended board Q&A; the Chair said board questions would be taken during the regular board meeting at 6:00 p.m. The hearing was then closed by motion (moved by Ben and seconded by Maggie) and the board adjourned until the regular meeting.

What remains open: the board will consider the questions and any formal action during its regular meeting, and Daryl flagged that some ANI improvement funding allocations may need to change because the middle-school D/F reduction goal was not met.