Petersburg school investigated for SOL irregularities gains accreditation

The Virginia Board of Education unanimously voted this morning to give full accreditation to Petersburg’s A.P. Hill Elementary School, where Standards of Learning testing irregularities were investigated this summer.

Petersburg schools Superintendent James M. Victory was emotional when he thanked the State Board for voting in the division’s favor.

“This feels almost like the birth of my first child,” a choked-up Victory told the Board.

A.P. Hill was the subject of an investigation after the Virginia Department of Education received a report that students were removed from class and did not participate in Standards of Learning assessment testing.

The investigation found that at least 12 students did not take one or more SOL tests, but according to attendance records should have taken those assessments or alternate assessments.

Had those 12 students failed the tests, pass rates would drop slightly, but the school still would have met all benchmarks to become fully accredited, said Shelley Loving-Ryder, assistant superintendent for the education department’s division of student assessment and school improvement.

In the wake of the investigation, the Petersburg School Board overhauled the administrative team at A.P. Hill. Last night, the school board named Sabrina Beamon as the new principal.

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Patricia I. Wright recommended that A.P. Hill be given full accreditation status because “I am satisfied corrective action was swift; it was decisive.”

The full accreditation of A.P. Hill gives Petersburg four schools to receive that status. Last year, Robert E. Lee Elementary School was the lone school to receive full accreditation.