Friday, March 29, 2024

New Simpson Hill Wins National Award

New Simpson Hill School was awarded the 2020 National Blue Ribbon School Award for “exemplary achievement, closing the gap” school. The school was nominated by the Illinois State Board of Education and was notified through a nationwide video announcement from U.S. Department of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Thursday, September 24th. New Simpson Hill is one of 367 schools (public and private) nationwide to receive this award.

This coveted award is an affirmation of the hard work and dedication of students, teachers, parents and the community of New Simpson Hill. The nomination from the Illinois State Board of Education came after the school showed a vast improvement of test scores on the Illinois Assessment of Readiness (IAR), the state mandated test given to students in grades 3rd-8th. In addition to improved test scores on the IAR, the school also showed improvements on the state mandated Illinois Science Assessment (ISA) given to students in the 5th grade and 8th grade.