Review of Academic Achievement at the Pierre Indian Learning Center

We performed this inspection of Pierre Indian Learning Center, an off-reservation boarding school located in Pierre, SD, evaluating its programs to help close the educational achievement gap and increase graduation rates. The No Child Left Behind Act, signed into law in January 2002, requires schools to complete a comprehensive needs assessment with which to develop a strategy aimed at meeting students’ academic development needs. We intended to use the assessment to help evaluate progress at Pierre Indian Learning Center; unfortunately, the school could not provide a copy.

 

We found that the school updated its assessment only every 5 years. As a result, the school’s unique student population does not have the benefit of the information available through the assessment on the off years when the assessment is not performed. Identifying and prioritizing student needs can help decision makers develop school-wide reform strategies that offer increased academic achievement opportunities for school children. The needs assessment might also help decision makers allocate scarce resources wisely in support of students’ educational achievement.

 

Even though officials did not have such a process in place to identify student needs, they did detail programs used to help teachers focus on specific student needs without undermining overall progress teaching the planned curriculum. Referred to as a red card program, it gave specific assistance to students who had difficulty focusing in class. The school used this and related programs to help students improve academically.

 

Since all states also require some form of English language learner (ELL) assessment, Pierre Indian Learning Center administered the WAPT assessment, used in South Dakota to identify ELL students. School officials reported that they had no students identified as ELL, but that they had found profound hearing loss among the student population and so screened all students for hearing and speech acuity prior to administering WAPT.

 

We provided three recommendations to help Pierre Indian Learning Center improve its efforts to promote educational accomplishments among its students and close the achievement gap.