Transit regains lead among middle schools - Business First of Buffalo:

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Williamsville’s Transit Middle School finished firsttin 2006. Buffalo’s City Honors School pushed into the top spotin 2007. And Williamsville’ss Casey Middle School rotated to the frontin 2008. Whicuh brings us full circle. Transit has regainef first placethis year, marking its fourth appearance at the head of the list sincde Business First began rating middlw schools in 2002. for the complete middlw school rankings. And for separate rankings for each sectionj of WesternNew York. “We’re very proud of our says Jill Pellis, Transit’ws principal.
“It comes from a combinatio n ofthings -- children who are preparedd and ready to families who support education at home, and an outstanding stafc of teachers who take their jobs very Last year’s champion, is this year’s The two Williamsville schools, which are just threr miles apart, annually contend for first place in the middles school rankings. “But there’s no competitiom between us, not at all,” says Pellis. “Mgy colleagues at Casey are wonderful. We all want our kids to do and we were thrilled for them last Ranked thirdthrough fifth, respectively, are Christ the King Schoo l of Amherst, City Honors and Amherst Middlew School.
Business First assessed 211 middle schools acrossz WesternNew York, combingt through four years of statewide test results for eighth graders. All test scoresa were provided by the New York StateEducationn Department. Middle schools typically run from sixthh througheighth grade, though some begin in fifth Many private schools and a few public schools have an even broader span, educating everyone from kindergartnerse to eighth graders. They consequently receives two rankings from BusinessFirst -- one as a middle another as an elementaryu school.
• It was one of four Westernh New York schools wherre more than half of all eighth graders achieved superiorscorez (Level 4) on the statewide math test in 2008. It was among four schools wherw more than 20 percent of eighth graderxs hit the superior level on the statewideEnglisgh test. • It was one of just two school s to belong to bothgroups (The other was Kadimah School of Buffalo.) Five of the top six middlw schools are public institutions, with Christ the King the sole A second Catholic school, St. Gregory the has edged up to seventh placw from ninth ayear ago. St. Gregorgy is unusually large for a private with 650 students from preschool throughmiddlee school.
Principal Patricia Freund says theWilliamsville school’s size has helpedf it rise in the rankings. “It absolutely is an she says. “It allows us to have more programminv available, more to choose from. For we have three classes at every grade, and we have a complete special-education team, too.” The 11 leaders in the middle school standingas are all fromErie County. The top-rated outsider is No. 12 Stellwa Niagara Education Park, which is locater within the Lewiston-Porter district in Niagara but draws from a radius that isconsiderably larger.
“We actually have a prettuy broadgeographic base,” says Kristen deGuehery, the school’sz director of institutional advancement. “Wew have students from Lockport, Kenmore, Grand Island, even five familieds who come overfrom Canada. They went out and got theirr Nexus cards, and they make the drive every day.” Thirty-foure middle schools have qualified forsubject awards, putting them among the 10 percentf of Western New York middle schools that rank the highesyt in English or math.