Calif. Schools Get Rankings Based on Tests

By Jessica L. Sandham

California officials last week ranked most of the state's 8,000 schools from 1 to 10 based on their performance on standardized tests, but softened the blow by telling low-scoring schools: Where you are now is not as important as where you're going to go.

Unveiled on Jan. 25, the academic-performance index is the long-awaited cornerstone of Gov. Gray Davis' plan to hold schools more accountable for academic results. On the basis of students' performance on the Stanford Achievement Test-9th Edition, the state assigned all schools a score ranging from 200 to 1,000.

Only 12 percent of the 7,100 schools that were included in the index this year logged scores that met or surpassed the state's...