This research report examines the performance of the three Greenwood County school districts relative to that of other school districts in South Carolina. Emphasis is placed on the levels and trends in district assessments, personnel, funding, and overall student achievement. The effects of high school dropouts and district poverty measures on academic achievement is also explored. Since the first Greenwood education benchmarking report was prepared in 1999, the state of South Carolina implemented a new achievement test, the Palmetto Achievement Challenge Test (PACT).  This report includes six years of PACT data.       

• Greenwood County Education Benchmarking: Fiscal Years 1991-92 to 2003-04, by Ellen W. Saltzman, Harold L. Long, and H. Gregory Hawkins, May 2005, revised December 2005

This first Greenwood education benchmarking report and its companion data report from 1999 examine PK-12 public education finance and academic performance data at the school district level. Emphasis is placed on the three school districts in Greenwood County and how they compare on various measures to other school districts in South Carolina.

• Public Education and Greenwood County: A Benchmarking Tool 
• SC School District Profile Data, 1997-98, by Louis R. Lanier and Ellen Weeks Saltzman, December 1999

This report was prepared in response to a South Carolina state-wide survey of public pre-school teachers in grades K4 and K5. The survey was distributed electronically to 100 teachers throughout South Carolina. The accompanying analysis of data was obtained from 32 participants who represented a response rate of 32 percent. The survey was distributed in order to obtain response data from classroom teachers whose opinion was sought in the development of an Early Childhood Readiness Assessment. This draft report was prepared on March 8, 2005.

This report proposes a framework for evaluating performance on the PACT and SAT by examining performance relative to expectations and performance relative to standards. Performance relative to expectations is actual test performance adjusted for poverty and other factors. Notable schools are identified using test data from 1999 and 2000.