Coweta County

school officials are taking a two-pronged attack in countering the state's

claims that several schools are in need of improvement.

School officials

are disputing some of the data used to grade the schools, and last week

the Coweta County Board of Education indicated it was also protesting

the data.

In the last

two weeks, the system has learned that 10 of its schools were placed on

lists by the Department of Education that indicate the schools have to

offer tutoring or transfers or just shore up the testing scores at the

school.

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Officer Dean Jackson said four schools receiving Title One funds from

the federal government were earmarked for tutoring or transfers: Jefferson

Parkway Elementary, Newnan Crossing Elementary, Smokey Road Middle and

Evan Middle.

But the system

has already had Newnan Crossing removed from the list, and is working

on the others.

"Every

school met or exceeded the academic standards. It's just that we have

questions with some of their data," Jackson said.

He explained

that 95 percent of the students must take the different tests the state

uses to evaluate the schools. Additionally, there are several subgroups

evaluated at each school, such as special education and ethnic groups.

In the subgroups, 95 percent of the students must also take the tests.

"We think

that we can show where we have had enough students taking the tests,"

Jackson said.

Six other schools

also made a needs improvement list last week, but will not have to offer

tutoring or transfers because they don't receive any Title One funds.

Jackson said the schools on the latest list were Arnall Middle, East Coweta

Middle, Madras Middle, East Coweta High, Northgate High and Newnan High.

"We're

also going back and investigating the numbers at those schools. There

just seems to be discrepancies between the state and our count,"

he said.

Jackson did

not know when the issue would be settled, but said the school system wants

to make sure all the data is evaluated fairly.

"Being

on these lists has a bad connotation, and we want to make sure that mistakes

weren't made," he added.