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Batavia district reports proficiency gains, says it is off ISBE disproportionality list
Summary
Batavia USD 101 leaders told the board they saw districtwide gains in proficiency and belonging, credited building-level interventions and student voice, and announced the district is no longer on an ISBE significant-disproportionality citation after multi-year work on special education identification.
Batavia USD 101 officials on May 26 told the school board the district made measurable gains this year in student proficiency and social‑emotional measures while completing work required by the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE).
Carrie Ruh, the district’s director of special education, said the district received notification that it is off the ISBE ‘significant disproportionality’ list after years of efforts to reduce over‑identification of Black students for specific learning disabilities. “This is a huge celebration for our entire district,” Ruh said, adding that the work must be sustained and remains ongoing.
Superintendent Dr. Newkirk and other district leaders illustrated the results using the district’s public dashboard (bps101.net). They reported increases in MAP and reading proficiency for many subgroups: reading growth for low‑income students rose from roughly 44% to 56% in a reported comparison, IEP group growth improved, and EL exit rates rose in grades four and five, officials said. Joanne Smith, the high‑school principal, said Panorama belonging scores rose to 73% at the secondary level; multiple elementary principals reported gains in belonging and literacy at their schools.
District staff also highlighted declines in chronic absenteeism across demographic groups and described 2,612 total discipline incidents this year involving about 811 students. Officials told the board there were 13 founded bullying incidents and 12 investigations that were not found to meet the state definition of bullying; the district intends to provide more detail on incident outcomes and restorative steps on request.
Board members pressed staff on data disaggregation, how subgroup improvements were measured, and next steps. Several principals credited targeted student focus groups, PLC (professional learning community) practices and new curricular resources for their gains. The district noted that ACT scores were delayed by the state and that AP and ACCESS results would be posted when available.
What’s next: district leaders plan to continue Panorama‑aligned SEL work, implement restorative practices for staff this summer and maintain monitoring of subgroup performance; they also pledged to update the community dashboard when state test data are available.
