Triton, Bremen Make Schools "A" List
By Stacey Creasy
BREMEN � You have to run through the list a couple of times to find schools from Marshall County that managed to earn the Indiana State Chamber�s 2002 Best Buy School designation.
Last year, four county schools made the list.
This year, only Bremen and Triton remain on the list.
The state chamber looks at high schools across the state and selects �Best Buy� schools, defined as public high schools which provide exceptional educational value for the tax dollars they receive. Best Buy schools are those that offer all of us, taxpayers and stakeholders in the public education system, the greatest return in terms of student achievement for our educational dollar.
To determine which schools qualify as Best Buys, the chamber uses ISTEP scores, graduation and attendance rates and SAT composite scores and participation rates for 12th-graders to develop each school�s �quality index,� which they then compared with the school�s expenditures per pupil and at-risk factor ranking (at-risk factors include poverty, students from single-parent homes and percentage of adults within the school district with no high school diploma).
For 2002, less than one-third of the schools in the state, 112 out of 346 public schools were named Best Buys.
Triton and Bremen High Schools were the
only Marshall
County high
schools to make the
list.
In 2001, Argos
and Culver joined
them
In fact, Argos
and Culver earned
special 2001
recognition by being
named a Best Buy school and making the Indiana Chamber�s Honor Roll.
Culver has witnessed some changes since then. The school is completing a building project. Culver students did not do as well on the ISTEP this year.
To make the Honor Roll, the school must meet the quality index and expenditure level, plus have an above average of at-risk students in the school corporation.
No area school received Honor Roll status for 2002.
The chamber listed the state median expenditure per pupil as $5,432.62.
Triton was less than the state median expenditure per pupil at $5,132.98 while Bremen was far below the state median expenditure per pupil at $4,991.62.
Bremen Superintendent Brent Kauf-mann said he is proud the school made the Best Buy list once again.
�Last year we were also named a Four-Star School,� Kaufmann said. �I think it shows our staff is determined to give our students the best education possible while the staff and the school board keep a close eye on the dollars we spend. They do an amazing job.�
Triton High School Prinicipal Rick Dehne said he is proud of the designation.
�I think it is great. We made the list last year too. I�m proud we made it again,� Dehne said.
�We are really working hard around here and � as good as we are now� we are going to get better. We are going to surprise some people around here.�
There are only a handful of schools in Michiana that made the list: Tippecanoe Valley, Warsaw, Concord, Crown Point, Fairfield Junior-Senior, Goshen; New Prairie, and Wawasee made the list.
Fairfield is the lone area school to make the Best of the Best list in 2002.
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