It's time today to find out how schools in Wake County and statewide fared for the 2011-12 school year.

State ABC results will be released online here by 10 a.m. They come, as noted in today's article by Lynn Bonner, as part of the last year of the state's ABCs program.

Wake announced last week that preliminary results indicated districtwide gains. This includes passing rates rising to 82.1 percent in elementary and middle schools and 85.2 percent in high school.

Here's a condensed recap of today's press conference held by Wake County Superintendent Tony Tata.

Tata reported that both the overall rate of incidents of school crime and of violent crime in particular had dropped. There were 41 reported violent incidents this past school year, compared to 99 the prior year.

“Make no mistake,” Tata. “It’s my belief that one violent crime incident is one too many but we’re moving in the right direction here.”

It looks like the Wake County school system saw some overall academic gains this past school year under the state's ABCs of Public Education accountability program.

New results released at today's State Board of Education meeting show that 95 percent of Wake's schools met or exceeded growth expectations, up from 89 percent last year. Wake had 70.3 percent of schools, or 114, showing high growth and 24.7 percent of schools, or 40, showing expected growth.

Wake also had 17 Honor Schools of Excellence/Schools of Excellence, up from 14 last year. Wake also had 79 Schools of Distinction, up from 63 last year.

It's time to find out today how students in Wake County and the rest of North Carolina fared on state exams this past year.

At 10 a.m., the 2010-11 ABCs of Public Education results will be released at the state Board of Education meeting. What could make the results of more interest this year is that it comes out months before what should be a heated school board election here in Wake.

Tune back to the blog at 10 a.m. for a report on how Wake fared.

Academic performance went up both in the Wake County school system and public schools statewide this past school year.

New ABCs of Public Education test data released this morning shows that 146 of 158 Wake schools, or 92 percent, met or exceeded state growth standards. That compares to 138 of 155 schools, 89 percent the prior year. (I'm excluding Longview because it has no ABCs status.)

Wake also had 14 Honor Schools or Excellence or Schools of Excellence, meaning schools had passing rates of at least 90 percent and met growth goals. That's up from 12 schools last year.

We'll find out in detail this morning how well schools did in Wake County and statewide this past school year.

During today's state Board of Education meeting, the 2009-10 ABC of Public Education report will be released. Based on last week's Locke Foundation analysis of a leaked copy of the report, test scores have gone up both in Wake and statewide.

Expect both sides of the school diversity fight in Wake to spin today's results.

Wake's high school graduation rate has dropped more than what was previously reported.

The state released this month revised graduation rates for individual school districts. In Wake, the overall 4-year graduation rate is 78.4 percent. It had been reported at 78.6 percent in August.

The graduation rate also dropped since August for several Wake groups, including low-income students.

You can now see for yourself the kinds of questions that students are asked on the state's standardized tests.

State education officials posted online today copies of the end-of-grade and end-of-course tests that were taken this past school year. The goal is to promote transparency at a time when questions have been raised about what students are tested on.

Three versions of each state exam are offered annually. One version of each exam was posted online and will no longer be used in the state's testing program.

Click here to view the tests and the answer keys.

Guilford County Schools' Mission Possible program is often cited by school board critics in Wake County who argue that intensive funding is a better way than busing to help high-poverty schools.

Well, the newly released state ABCs test results may put a dent in that idea. Guilford County has 10 of the state's 75 low-performing schools this year, meaning the school's passing rate was under 50 percent and it didn't meet growth expectations.

Of the 10 low-performing Guilford County schools, nine are in the Mission Possible program. The passing rate was as low as 29.7 percent at one of the Mission Possible schools - Oak Hill Elementary.

Wake saw improvement on this year's latest round of ABCs results that can't be attributed to just the inclusion of retests in elementary and middle schools.

Wake had 12 Honors Schools of Excellence and Schools of Excellence, meaning at least 90 percent passed state exams and the school made growth. That's compared to four schools last year.

All 12 schools were in the western part of the county.