Wilkes County Schools reports small overall proficiency decline, says Infinite Campus rollout is going well

Wilkes County Schools presented a districtwide accountability update Oct. 6 that showed a 1.4% decline in overall proficiency for 2024–25 compared with the prior year, with mixed results across grades and subjects.

Dr. Dion Stocks, Director of Testing and Accountability, summarized five-year trends and noted multi-year drops in 5th- and 6th-grade English language arts proficiency alongside gains in 7th-grade ELA. In math, elementary proficiency has declined—5th grade has experienced a three-year drop—while middle-school math, particularly 7th grade, showed multi-year increases. District math growth for grades 3–8 declined 0.1%, Math 1 declined 1.6%, Math 3 increased 9.6%, and English II declined 1.4%. Science proficiency fell substantially in some grades (5th grade down 10.5% and 8th grade down 10.5%); Biology declined 11.6%, a drop the presentation said was expected because of a new test.

"Infinite Campus overall is going great for Wilkes County Schools," Stocks said, praising the district’s Infinite Campus team—Chrissy Howell, Kristen Serbeck, data managers and lead teachers—for problem-solving during the transition. Stocks told the board the volume of questions about the new Student Information System has tripled from previous years but described implementation as successful.

Stocks emphasized that ‘‘not meeting growth’’ in the district accountability metrics does not mean every student failed to make progress; rather, he said the mathematical average of cohorts did not grow as much as state peers in some measures. The presentation included subgroup proficiency, growth comparisons to state peers and three-year trend lines the board reviewed as part of regular accountability reporting.

The board received the data and discussed curriculum focus items; no formal action on curriculum changes was taken at the Oct. 6 meeting.