ACT initiative greatly improves scores in Jackson County School District
MDE recently released the 2020-2021 ACT results for the 11th grade state assessment and make-up assessment for the class of 2021 who missed their testing date due to school closures in the spring of 2020.
Jackson County School District, as a district, has improved from sixth on the Coast in the 2018-2019 school year to third in the 2020-2021 school year.
Additionally, the district improved in state rankings from ninth in the ’18-’19 school year to fifth in the ’20-’21 school year.
This jump is thanks to a new district-wide initiative the Jackson County School District implemented last year to boost ACT scores.
Superintendent John Strycker says one of the most important steps in the plan was to hire four ACT prep specialists for the students. “We’re always looking to improve. It’s like an athletic program. You know when you look at a football program, there’s so much energy put into that. We’re trying to create that excitement for the academics, for that test and so we’re going to approach it like a coach would a team. We’re gonna analyze it how the season went. It went well, but we think we can do better.”
The plan costs about $400,000 and the board is looking to make more improvements to it in the near future.
