MADISONVILLE-The Monroe County School System is holding steady with national average in student achievement, after Report Card scores for the system were released last week.

Monroe County had straight C's across the board for academic achievement in 2012 in all subjects, the same scores the school system held in 2011.

"We're not thrilled about that," said Data Instructor Lee Anne Strickland. "But it could have been worse."

While academic achievement findings show that students remained "average" from 2011 to 2012, value added scores showed improvements in most fields.

The value added score is a measurement of students' growth in a year's time. In comparison to 2011 scores, Monroe County as a system improved from a D to a B in math, from a F to a D in science and from a D to a B in social studies.

A disappointment of this year's Report Card findings is that the system-wide value added score in reading and language arts dropped from a C to a D.

"In general, our biggest disappointment is in reading and language arts," said Stickland. "We had a drop in grades third through eight and we don't know why. We were really disappointed in that."

Strickland said due to the low score in reading and language arts, the school system will focus heavily on that subject and improving that score in the upcoming year.

A highlight of this year's Report Card findings is that Monroe County led East Tennessee in Alegbra 1 achievement.

"As a district, we had the highest growth in East Tennessee in Alegbra," said Strickland. "We are excited about that."

All other high school subjects [biology, English and U.S. History] showed no detectably different growth from the predicted score.

Fifth, eighth and 11th grades all scored an A in writing assessments, a score that has been pretty consistent for the past few years.

A few other system strengths included growth in fourth-grade math, seventh grade math, fourth, sixth and seventh grade science. All grades also showed improvements in social studies and writing.

The county school system's graduation rate increased significantly again. As a whole, the district's graduation rate now sits at 94.9 percent, up from 91.3 percent last year.

Tellico Plains High School's graduation rate increased from 92.6 to 94.6 percent, Sequoyah High School's graduation rate increased from 93.9 to 94.9 percent, and Sweetwater High School's graduation rate increased from 89.7 to 94.7 percent. Monroe Academy also showed the greatest growth in their graduation rate, increasing from last year's 82.2 percent to 96.3 percent.

Strickland said some additional areas of focus in 2012-2013 will be the achievement gap closure for economically disadvantaged students and continued improvements in science in grades third through eighth.

"There are some needs for improvement and opportunities for growth," said Strickland. "We fully expect to do that."