CatholicBoardHuron-Superior Catholic Board trustees talked about the latest Grade 10 Ontario Secondary School Literacy test results on Wednesday night.  79 percent of Grade 10 students at the board who took the test in 2014-15 successfully passed.  That’s down from 82 percent in 2013-14.  The provincial average for 2014-15 was 82 percent.  At the Academic level, there was a 92 percent success rate — down 4 percent from the previous school year, but comparable to the provincial average of 93 percent.  At the Applied level, the success rate of 50 percent that passed equals the provincial average for that group of students and was 3 percent higher than last year.  Over the last five years, the success rate at the Catholic board averages 79.6 percent, peaking at 82 percent in 2013-14.  Last year, the provincial average was 82 percent for passing the Grade 10 provincial literacy test, a slight drop of 1 percent from the previous school year.  The five year provincial average success rate was 82.4 percent, with a yearly rate of 82 or 83 percent during that time.   When it came to gender, 74 percent of boys passed the literacy test with 84 percent of girls successfully passing — a 10 percent gap.  The Huron-Superior figures are below the provincial averages of 78 and 86 percent, respectively.  Over the last five years, the average success rate for boys is 74 percent, with a peak of 78 percent in 2013-14.  For girls, the average success rate during that same period was 86.2 percent, with a peak of 90 percent in 2011-12.

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Results for 2014-15 EQAO testing for Grade 3 and 6 students was also discussed at Wednesday’s Catholic Board meeting.  67 percent of Grade 3 students at the board met the provincial standard for Reading in 2014-15 — down only 1 percent from 2013-14.  In writing, the success rate was 67 percent — a drop of 10 percent.  While in math, 59 percent of students met the provincial standard — Level 3 or 4 — a decline of 2 percent the year before.  In Grade 6, the success rate in reading was 78 percent — a decrease of 3 percent from last year.  In writing, 78 percent of students achieved the provincial standard, 3 percent lower than in 2013-14.  In math, the success rate was 43 percent, 7 percent lower than last year.  The five year average success rate for Grade 3 reading is 65.8 percent, for writing 74.8 percent and for math 62.4 percent.  The highest peak for success was 78 percent in writing in 2010-11.  Over that same five year period, the average success rate for Grade 6 reading was 76 percent, for writing 74.6 percent and 49.2 percent for math.  Peaks for success of 81 percent were achieved just last year (2013-14) in reading and writing.  Girls continue to achieve higher success rates than boys over the last five years.  For Grade 3 boys, the average percentage the provincial standard was between 61 and 62 percent, with a peak of 72 percent in writing in 2012-13.  For girls, the percentage varied from 62.8 percent in math to 82.8 percent in writing, with a peak of 88 percent in writing last school year.  For Grade 6 boys, the average success rate was between 44.8 percent in math to 72 percent in reading, where a 78 percent peak was achieved this school year.  For girls, the average success rate ranged from 53.4 percent in math to 84.2 percent in writing, where a peak of 89 percent has been reached over the last two school years.