The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

10 - The Ganadian Champion, Frnday Novembêr 7, 1997 A littie *good news on schools By TIM WHITNELL Special to The Champion lmmersed in a province-wide strike, Halton Board of Education administrators and teachers have jointly received some good news with the results of student test- ing. The public board scored higher than the provincial average in aIl three subjects and at aIl four ability levels in grade 3 test scores released by the new 'ly-formed Education Quality and Accountability Office. Ncarly 3,000 grade 3 atudents in Halton were part of a group of 130,000 in Ontario which wrote reading, writing and math tests based on a common currculum pre- pared by former NDP Education Minister Dave Cooke. IlWe think the resulta for the Halton board are outstanding relative to thse rest of the province, but it's stili a question ot how we cari help more (students) do bet- ter," said education director Dusty Papke. "I don't think it's a matter of raising the bar but putting (more) kida over it," he said.* Grade 3 students were tested last spring in the basica of reading writing, and math- ematics with students being assigned a level of ability based on a score between one and four. 'Me ministry made Level 1 the lowest achievement, 2 and 3 are deemed the acceptable range of perfor- mance while 4 is the best. Halton officiais assigned their own terms, making 2 satisfactorY, 3 good and 4 excellent. in reading, the Halton board had 87 per cent of its grade 3 pupils score between levels 2 and 4 while the provincial mark was 80 per cent. in writing, Halton bad 88 per cent score n the itîrce uppce ets, the Uîtalio vle age was 82 per cent. In math, Halton placed 84 per cent in the top three levels; the provincial average was 76 per cent. In breaking the results down by gender, board officiais said Halton's grade 3 females scored about 4-5 per cent higher than boys over the three subjects in levels 3 and 4. -I don't tind the difference alarming," said education superintendent Kit Rankin. More precise analysis, on a municipali- ty-by-municipality baais in Halton, and at the individual sehool level. will be part of future follow-up work, said Ms Rankin. Ms Rankin believes the strong local results are not surprising under the circum- stances. "Our board has been very forward think- ing for a few years," she said, refemrng to e s. PUBLIC on page 32 M»KINNON WATERFALLS& I ~PONDS Corne In and s.. our wicre seiection of bird feeders at great prices. *Pond neltlng Is now In stock 10 help koop fallng leaves out. * Pond doicer avaliabls for only %64.97 "Aise Folks, Il's important le start aidding vilaminsltoyour f19h food tobelp tim through the winlfir." !24 Main St. E. Milton 876-2836 *FOR 39 YEARS ff~ W.C. (Bi111 ROWNEY KEEPS ON GENERATINO GREAT IDEAS * MR. BEAN PG - Evenlngl 7:00 P.M. à 9:00 p.M. 7 7YEARS IN TIBETA Evanngs :00 .m.W.C. (Bill) ROWNEY Community Service Experience * ~4*Scoutmaster * Hydro Commlssioner-39 years ~ eMilton Minor Hockey Association Past e Past Chair-restructuflflg committee for 00 0 1:fSecretary and President Hydro Electrical Utitities-Halton e Past Chair of Milton Arena Board * Past Chair-Municipal Etectrical Milton Sports Centre Fund Raising Association -Campaign *Treasurer-Ontario Minor Hockey SRAY NOV S *Strong supporter of Milton Youth Sports Association NELSON HIOH SCHOOL *Milton Businessman 45 years 4181 NeW Street, Burllngton EQUIPMENT REGISTRATIION 9:00 am- 10:30 amn SKI SWAP & SALE This NOVEMBER 10 re-elec 10:45 arn- 3:00 pin CHECKOUT TIME 3:00 Pm - 4:00 pm Halton e1 Cross-Country Ski Club WARD 2 HYDRO CM ISO E For lifoniiaUof a MAKE-THE LAST NAME ON THE BALLOT YOUR FIRST CHOICE cui Fl 5% 0OF f!CUPTS i