Test scores rose at most Scotland County schools last year, according to new figures approved Thursday by the State Board of Education.

Performance Composite Scores – a measure of the number of students considered literate by the state – went up at 18 of the system's 21 schools. The biggest gains were at North Laurinburg Elementary, which increased 15.5 points to 52.8 percent, South Scotland Elementary, which increased 11.7 points to 81.6 percent, and Scotland High School of Business, Finance and Marketing increased by 9.5 points to 47.7.

Only two schools saw a decrease. Ninth Grade Academy and Scotland Early College High School, dropped 5.3 and 5.9 points respectively.

More schools met their expected growth while fewer made high growth. Seventeen schools met their expected growth and eight were high growth, while 13 met their growth and 11 made high growth.

Among the four that did not meet expected growth was Shaw Elementary, a school the system wants to close due to poor performance. Shaw had the lowest composite score among elementary schools at 50.3, a 5 point increase over the previous year.

The other three that did not meet growth are Washington Park Elementary, Scotland High School of Health Science and Scotland High School of Visual and Performing Arts.

Andy Cagle, Scotland County Schools spokesperson, said the school system will make a presentation on the results at the school board meeting Monday night.

Cagle says the system will not publicly comment on the scores until then.

More than 70 percent of North Carolina's public schools now meet federal performance standards, an achievement helped in part by the State Board of Education's decision to include student retest results in the calculations.

The state Department of Public Instruction said 71 percent of schools met standards for adequate yearly progress in 2008-09, and the number of public schools earning the state's top school designations more than doubled.

Last year, 31.2 percent of the state's schools met the AYP standards.

DPI said the improvements were partially due to the board's decision to include reading, mathematics and science retest results for students in grades 3-8 in the state's ABCs accountability program and in the AYP calculations.