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PA Department of Education grades public schools, scores now released

It’s the second year the Department of Education is grading nearly 3,000 public schools across Pennsylvania.”The main part of it is for schools to s...
It's the second year the Department of Education is grading nearly 3,000 public schools across Pennsylvania."The main part of it is for schools to say, 'Okay, where do we need help at and where do we need to focus on," said Tim Eller, the Press Secretary for the Department of Education.

The 2013-2014 School Performance Profile was released Thursday and shows some schools in our area have a lot of work to do.

Both Harrisburg and York City School Districts have been labeled as "moderately distressed" by the state.

According to the report, every school in York City and several in Harrisburg scored under 60 on the 100 point scale.

"Anything under a 70 we obviously have room for improvement," Eller said.

Some school officials in Harrisburg say part of the problem comes down to teachers leaving the city for higher paying districts.

"The district is scrambling to replace them with first year teachers who have little to none experience," said Rich Askey, President of the Harrisburg Education Association.

The state takes into account several factors when grading the schools including test scores, graduation rates and overall attendance.

Some teachers, however, are calling for a more individualized grading system.

"With one size fits all testing, it's not even a fair evaluation of our teachers in Pennsylvania," Askey added.

It wasn't all bad news for schools in Central Pennsylvania.

The report showed a dozen York County schools scored above a 90.

Some parents say they will be looking at the school scores, but at the end of the day, they will trust their personal evaluations.

"I'm really impressed to know that my kid is going and he's around teachers that care about him," said Foose parent, Maleeka Bazemore.

Both years the state has graded their public schools, the results showed, as a whole, 72 percent of schools scored a 70 or higher.

For a full list of school scores across the state, click here.

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