Lockport Twp. HSD 205 committee reviews 2025 academic achievement report; board approves course changes and routine bills

Lockport Township High School District 205 committee members met to review the district—s 2025 annual academic achievement report and approved routine business items and new course proposals.

The report, presented in a new, condensed format, was introduced as an attempt to "make it more consumable" for the public and local stakeholders, including real-estate agents and feeder districts, according to the presentation leader. Staff credited Jeanette Castillo, Eric Slager and assessment coordinator Kelly Feathering for designing the report and supplying the data.

Why it matters: The packet showed substantial system-level shifts the district says are aimed at expanding rigorous opportunities for more students. Board members and staff highlighted an 800-student increase in participation in AP-level coursework alongside a roughly 10-percentage-point rise in AP pass rates. District staff also emphasized dual-credit expansion through partnerships with Joliet Junior College and said dual-credit courses are treated as genuine college coursework by the partner institution.

What the board heard and asked: In an interactive exercise, board members were asked to scan the executive summary and propose a short "elevator speech" about student performance. Board member Evelyn said, "This is telling us that our students are very much on level with where we should be, and that they're showing continuous growth and continuous improvement." Staff pointed to multiple measures (graduation rate, freshmen-on-track and ACT/assessment results) rather than a single metric.

Student supports and targeted interventions were a central focus. Staff described "insight cards" that counselors use to capture each student's career interests, learning preferences, barriers and named "trusted adults." Mr. Beach explained that insight cards help counselors target outreach. The district also described an "AP Advocates" peer-mentoring program now in its third year; presenters said there are about 50 advocates to support roughly 200 new sophomores participating in AP coursework.

Special-education and career-readiness highlights included a strong DRS (vocational rehabilitation) contract, a Lockport Academy career facilitator, internship and work-placement programs, and a pilot intensive driver-education class for some students with cognitive impairments that produced permit/license gains.

Assessment context and concerns: Staff explained that Illinois uses the ACT as its accountability exam and that, for the first time at the high-school level, growth metrics appear on the state school report card. The presenter said the district—s corrected graduation rate is "really 97 percent," while noting 27 students were counted as non-graduates in cohort accounting (15 students with special-education transitions and 12 non-Special Education students who did not graduate with the cohort).

Board members pressed staff about ACT proficiency. The presenter flagged complex-reading proficiency as an area needing work: "54 percent of our students are approaching proficiency, 29 are at proficiency, and 17 are exceeding proficiency," and said cross-curricular work to teach complex reading and inference could raise ACT performance.

Planned actions and pilots: The district will run a practice ACT on Nov. 4 and use frequency/distribution charts to identify students and specific skills (for example, "locating details in complex passages") for targeted instruction. Staff described an ongoing Varsity Tutors pilot (currently for juniors) and said results will inform whether to expand tutoring or make it a Compass offering. The board approved a test-taking-skills course and other course proposals that staff said were edited to open certain offerings to grades 10 and 11 rather than juniors only.

Votes and formal actions: The committee approved the bills-payable addendum and voted to approve the new course proposals (moved and seconded in committee); a motion to adjourn carried at 7:20 p.m.

What comes next: Staff said the full Illinois School Report Card will be released under state embargo the following week; the district will present the unembargoed data to the board (scheduled for Nov. 17 in the meeting materials) and share disaggregated frequency analyses with feeder-district curriculum leaders in January to support articulation and curricular alignment.