The Lafayette Parish School System is beginning to take steps to help groups of students.

When the state released district and school performance scores in November, it also broke down scores among subgroups. The state labels such subgroups as “urgent intervention required” if that school had a subgroup score equal to an "F" for two consecutive years.

In Lafayette Parish, several schools had subgroups with UIR labels, even if the entire school had an above average score.

The state issued UIR academic designations the subgroup of students with disabilities at L.J. Alleman Middle, Paul Breaux Middle, Carencro Middle, Carencro Heights Elementary, Charles Burke Elementary, Katharine Drexel Elementary, Evangeline Elementary, J.W. Faulk Elementary, Lafayette Middle (which also had a UIR designation for black students), Live Oak Elementary, Ossun Elementary and Prairie Elementary.

Judice Middle had a UIR designation for its subgroup who are English language learners.

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The state also issued UIR designations for schools that had students with discipline problems. The designation is for schools with an out-of-school suspension rate greater than twice the national average for three consecutive years.

Lafayette Parish schools with the discipline UIR designation were Acadian Middle, Alice Boucher Elementary, Carencro Middle, Carencro Heights Elementary, Evangeline Elementary, J.W. Faulk Elementary, Lafayette Middle, Live Oak Elementary, N.P. Moss Prep and Northside High.

“Those schools are schools that we have to write plans for and submit to the state department for approval by BESE to show our plan to support growth in particular subgroups,” said Irma Trosclair, Lafayette Parish’s assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction.

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At a Dec. 5 workshop, Lafayette officials said they were seeking clarification on the exact requirements for addressing the needs of these subgroups. But there is a good chance the parish may have to purchase new academic materials for English classes at schools with academic UIR designations.

The materials would be classified as Tier I, which the state defines as ones that “meet all non-negotiable criteria and scored the best possible on all indicators of superior quality.”

The price for those materials could run up to $2.5 million, although officials said they will seek grant and federal funding to help alleviate the cost.

Trosclair said Lafayette officials were told that the Tier I materials would not be required for schools that had a UIR designation for discipline.

“We are going to have to develop a plan for discipline improvement, but it doesn’t require the Tier I material being implemented,” she said.

On the academic side, one lingering question was whether an entire school would have to use Tier I materials if the UIR designation applied only to a subgroup. Officials said that may be the case, but they were still seeking further details from the state.

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Even so, some school board members said they would support the idea of moving the entire district toward Tier I materials, since they are considered the best quality available. The cost for such a transition would be in the millions and would probably take place over a few years if implemented.

“It does seem that it should be a goal of the district to move all of our curricula to Tier I at some point,” said board member Dawn Morris. “I know that the teachers are comfortable with what we currently have and nobody likes change, especially when they’re already so busy, but it does seem that should be a goal regardless.”