Posted by 
MEAD GRUVER, Associated Press Writer
CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) ― About half of students enrolled in the Wyoming Virtual School who took the statewide assessment this year scored much worse than students in traditional schools around the state.
As for the other half, no one knows.
District-by-district and school-by-school results from this year’s Proficiency Assessments for Wyoming Students, or PAWS test, have been out for nearly a month. But state and local officials have yet to compile a complete set of scores for the Wyoming Virtual School.
Wyoming Virtual School students essentially are home-schooled with some guidance from public school teachers. The partly online curriculum is provided by a private company, Herndon, Va.-based K12 Inc.
Campbell County School District 1 in Gillette launched the K-6 school in 2006 and enrolled 76 students last year.
This was the first year more than a handful of students in the virtual school took the assessment test, an annual, statewide exam for students in grades 3-8 and 11. The virtual school students took the test in classrooms, not at home.
The available results — the combined scores of about 30 students in Campbell County — show less-than-stellar performance:
— Fifty percent of Wyoming Virtual School students in grades 3-6 scored in either the “proficient” range or “advanced” range in math. The statewide average for grades 3-6 was 76 percent.
— In reading, 41 percent of Wyoming Virtual School students tested in the proficient range or above. The statewide average was 64 percent.
— In writing, 22 percent of Wyoming Virtual School students scored in the proficient range or higher. The statewide average in writing was 53 percent.
“We’re not where we want to be. We’ll continue to work to improve and to raise those numbers in the future,” said Alex Ayers, the district’s assistant superintendent of curriculum and assessment.
K12 Inc. said it didn’t have enough information about the test scores to comment.
While the Campbell County School District compiled test scores for virtual school students who live in Campbell County, the district has yet to obtain scores from students elsewhere in the state.
About half of the virtual school’s students last school year lived in 10 other counties. The reason the Campbell County district doesn’t have those scores is the state Department of Education combined them with scores at brick-and-mortar elementary schools — the schools those students would be attending if they weren’t enrolled at the virtual school.
The principal of the virtual school, Roger Larsen, said he’s been trying to collect the rest of his students’ scores from other districts. He called the situation frustrating.
“The scores get scattered around the state, and just trying to gather them up we’ve found much more difficult than anticipated,” Larsen said.
The department eventually should be able to compile a complete set of scores for the Wyoming Virtual School, said Mary Kay Hill, the department’s director of administration.
“As we move along, you bet. We will be building a system that will allow us to pull up that data and be able to report, statewide, how those kids are doing,” she said.
(© 2009 The Associated Press.