Phila. School Officials Proud of Increased Performance

There's a big jump in the number of Philadelphia Schools hitting the mark, under "No Child Left Behind."

KYW's Mike DeNardo reports that Philly school officials are trumpeting the fact that 158 schools made Adequate Yearly Progress last year. That's up 33-percent over the 119 schools making AYP the year before.

Associate Superintendent David Weiner says 32 of the poorly performing Empowerment Schools made the grade, compared to 19 last year:

"Our success is really in those Empowerment Schools. We have schools like Fitzpatrick and Cramp and several other schools that are Empowerment Schools that have made incredible increases and gains."

AYP -- a measure of test scores, graduation rates and attendance rates -- is how schools are measured under "No Child Left Behind."

(file photo by KYW's Mike DeNardo)