In Saline, like many other school districts in Washtenaw County, today's release of Michigan Merit Exam and ACT test scores for the just completed school year is a time for celebration.

“We’re very proud of our students,” Superintendent Scot Graden said. “Our staff is doing a great job to make sure students are well-prepared for whatever is next for them, whether it’s college or something else. Our community is very supportive of quality education.”

Saline Superintendent Scot Graden

Saline isn't alone. Results released today show seven of the 13 districts or charter schools in Washtenaw County scored above the state mean ACT composite score.

Saline saw growth in four of the five areas tested on the MME and in six of the seven categories on the ACT when comparing the 2010 test results with the 2009 test results. Saline also had the highest mean ACT composite score of any district in the county.

But Graden says Saline wants to do even better.

“At times, it can be hard to develop a sense of urgency when our scores are high,” Graden said. “You can walk into a meeting about improving our education and in the back of your mind is, ‘we already have good scores.’”

Graden wants the lessons taught by Saline’s teachers to stick around longer than for a test. That’s why he and the district are focusing on project-based learning and using technology, among other approaches.

“That is paying off in these standardized tests," he said. "None of these are at a hundred. We can still improve. It’s a growth model. We want to be growing.”

Across the county, districts as a whole and individual high schools saw increases in 41 categories on the MME, while they saw decreases in 46 categories.

Beyond continued growth in the overall scores, there are always individual students to worry about, Ann Arbor Superintendent Todd Roberts said.

That’s not just for students who are struggling. The district looks at the students who scored as proficient and then at how many of those fall into the advanced proficient category. Getting into the advanced category is a good predictor of success down the road, Roberts said.

Ann Arbor Superintendent Todd Roberts

Ann Arbor had increases in three of the five MME categories and five of the seven ACT categories. The district had the second-highest mean ACT composite score, just 0.4 off Saline's score.

Roberts said he’s encouraged by the results, particularly as he looks at the lowest-performing students in the district.

“The groups that are the lowest made the most progress,” he said.

That can be seen even at the Roberto Clemente Student Development Center, traditionally the lowest performing of the district’s high schools. The percentage of students ranking as proficient jumped nearly 15 percentage points in math and nearly 11 points in social studies.

It wasn't a success story in every local school district.

The Lincoln school district saw declines in every category on both the MME and ACT.

But Superintendent Lynn Cleary said those numbers aren't accurate.

"We have an appeal in place," she said. "We were told that our students that are attending the Early College Alliance would have their scores sent back to us. It looks like about 40 of our students who attend the ECA weren't included. That's almost 10 percent of our students."

Cleary said district officials will be working hard on the issue in the coming days to get clarification.

Ypsilanti also saw drops in multiple categories. The district was at least 17 percentage points under the state average in every category on the MME, including being just over 29 percentage points lower than the state average in science.

“We are aggressively devising instructional reforms for fall that will increase the rigor of our courses to align with the common standards recently adopted by the Michigan Department of Education,” said Jennifer Martin, assistant superintendent of educational quality. “Low student performance is unacceptable, and I’m confident there will be different results in the future.”

Ypsilanti Superintendent Dedrick Martin

Superintendent Dedrick Martin agreed.

“We have identified several internal deficiencies at the secondary level, and Jennifer Martin continues to move forward with a restructuring plan," he said. "She has been meeting with administrators, building level leaders, teachers, parents and students to prepare a fall implementation that will raise expectations for teaching and learning. Over the summer, we have also been meeting with our university partners and have secured a renewed commitment to engage students in the learning process resulting in greater achievement.”

Across the state, scores for Michigan high school students kept improving in most subjects, state officials said, a trend they attribute to the state's tougher graduation requirements.

Public school scores on the Michigan Merit Exam improved in math, science, reading and writing. The percentage of students scoring proficient or better in those subjects is the highest in the four-year history of the exam.

Scores declined in social studies.

The tests were taken in the spring, primarily by last academic year's high school juniors. They are the first students who will be required by law to meet the more stringent graduation standards approved by the Legislature four years ago. The standards include more mandatory math and science classes.

David Jesse covers K-12 education for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at davidjesse@annarbor.com or at 734-623-2534.