Academics

Information for Students, Parents and Caregivers

Click on this link to access our Student and Parent/Caregivers Handbook for more information about our wonderful school.

Assessment 

Student assessment is gathered through a number of proven strategies used regularly by the classroom teachers in accordance with the Ministry of Education's Growing Success document. Student assessment figures prominently in both the Board's Assessment Policy and Action plan. St. Francis Catholic School, like its sister schools, continues to gather student data to use for planning and determining next steps. Observation, anecdotal notes, running records and portfolios may all be used for assessment purposes as well as peer and self-assessments which promote learning and academic improvement.

Provincial testing (EQAO) provides another perspective that reflects student progress in relation to the Language and Mathematics standards set out in the new Ontario Curriculum for Grades 3 and 6. The results are considered in conjunction with additional school information regarding student performance in reading, writing and mathematics. The school staff, board personnel and resource people use these results to determine best practices in teaching, review resources and curriculum development and inform future planning.

EQAO:  Protection of Personal Information

In order to ensure the confidentiality of individual student results and to discourage generalizations about school and board performance based on very small populations, EQAO has established a minimum number of participating students for the public reporting of achievement results. As a result, schools and boards with very few students participating in Grade 3 and Grade 6 will not have their results posted publicly. Similarly, reports for schools and boards with very few participating students in one grade may have no results provided in some sections of their public report.

The minimum number of participating students for publication of achievement results is 15. The minimum number of respondents for the release of questionnaire results is 6. The EQAO term for the application of these rules is "suppression."

For more information regarding EQAO results, please contact the school.

Plans for the Future

All stakeholders in the St. Francis Catholic School community are committed to seeking ways for continuous improvement in student learning. Professional development for all staff is ongoing. Our school staff works together with board supports to increase student literacy and numeracy success. Levelled reading materials and math resources based on the updated (2020) curriculum have been purchased and are actively used in the JK to grade 6 classrooms.