Schools awarded for WASL gains

Five Title I schools in Spokane are among 48 statewide to receive $3,500 apiece from the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction for showing three years of annual improvements in WASL scores. The improvements were made by the entire student body but also within smaller groups of students like minorities, those still learning English and those in special education.

The local schools are: Regal, Holmes, Stevens and Bemiss elementaries, and Shaw Middle School.

Title I schools are those where a significant number of the students qualify for subsidized lunches, one indication of poverty.

Acronym of the Week

This week’s acronym, selected at random from the hundreds that are listed on the state’s education Web site, is TTT.

Wikipedia, the occasionally reliable online encyclopedia, lists 22 different definitions, including tic-tac-toe and “The Two Towers,” the second installment of J.R.R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy.

In this case, TTT stands for Troops to Teachers, a program of the U.S. departments of Education and Defense that helps military personnel start new careers as teachers. Its motto is “Proud to Serve Again.”

TTT helps them find the appropriate training programs and provides financial assistance for those who agree to teach for three years in a high-needs school.

Number of the week

19 – percentage of PSAT-taking high school juniors who say they hope for a career in health and science, according to the College Board. That’s the group that administers the test, which is preliminary to the SAT.

Rounding out the top five responses: business management (10 percent); visual and performing arts (9.5 percent); engineering (8 percent); and education (5 percent).

But 11 percent of those highly motivated high-school juniors were not ready to talk about college majors, along with 14 percent of sophomores who took the test.