Now is not the time for knee-jerk responses to recent accountability scores for local public schools.

On Tuesday, the Mississippi Department of Education released its annual grades for the Natchez-Adams School District. For the second year in a row, the school district received a “D” grade based on the most recent state test scores and a variety of other factors, including graduation rate, college and career readiness and attendance.

Almost immediately, the school district’s naysayers responded to the news on social media by pointing fingers and beating their drums of negativity.

The reaction comes despite the district’s recent signs of improvement on test scores that were released in August, which showed a slight increase in both math and English above last year’s scores.

Unfortunately, the improvement was not enough to give the school district a “C” grade this year.

Overall, the school district scored 527 points on this year’s MDE report. The score is 12 points higher than last year’s 515 score and less than 10 points from the 536 points needed to give the District a “C” grade.

Just two years ago, the district was labeled as failing by MDE.

Although slight, this year’s improvements show the district continues to move in a positive direction and find some success.

Do we wish school district scores were better? Yes.

But, we realize a quick answer to education success does not exist. No magic wand can be waved over the Natchez-Adams School District that will solve the challenges that face our school district in one year.

In this age of immediate gratification, that may be a concept that may be difficult to comprehend for some. 

One thing is sure, a knee-jerk response of negativity is not needed and is counterproductive.

The way to higher test scores will be accomplished by building on the district’s successes, no matter how small, not by tearing the district down one negative comment at a time.