Sunny View top 10 percent

Tryon Elementary School was recently recognized by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction’s Federal Programs Division as the second top Title 1 school in the state for the school year 2012-2013.
Sunny View Elementary was also recognized as a top 10 percent Title 1 school in the state.
A reward school is a Title 1 school that, based on the most recent data, has been identified as among the highest ten percent of all Title 1 school, in one of two categories.
Reward schools have sustained the highest performance on student achievement over a number of years or made the most progress in improving student achievement over a number of years. Tryon received the second top Title 1 School out of 81 schools across the state that were recognized. Tryon and Sunny View both received rewards in the “high performance” category.
Tryon Elementary’s Title 1 teacher Kim McCool said the process was quite lengthy. Tryon received notification in August and began to complete the application of writing five essays; first describing the student population; second being a description of the program’s curriculum, instruction, programs, strategies, activities, best practices and sustainability; third on how Tryon offered professional development in the district; fourth on the school’s collaboration efforts with family and the community and a fifth on the program’s partnering agency certifications to show the support the school receives from the community.
“Our students and staff would not be as successful without the support they give us,” McCool said.
Tryon received a required site visit from the state in early October and were notified on Oct. 31 of the honor.
McCool said Tryon is very proud to be recognized as second in the state. A school from Haywood County won first place.
Tryon Elementary placed in the top 10 of all schools in North Carolina last year as a Title I Distinguished School by continuing for the previous two years to rank high in the category of sustained high performance. Although no money was available for this year’s second place award, last year Tryon Elementary received funding. The funding from last year enabled Tryon Elementary to purchase one Chromebook cart with 25 Chromebooks for fifth graders; two iPad carts with 25 iPads each for Kindergarten through fourth grades; Smartboard technology and book sets for the school’s Book Nook.
Schools are given banners for the recognition. Tryon plans to display this year’s banner in its library hall.