The Missouri State Board of Education has voted to drop St. Louis Public Schools to provisional accreditation after the district failed to submit its annual audit on time.
District officials and the school board president could not be immediately reached for comment.
The surprise decision to drop SLPS’s status to provisional accreditation will bring additional state oversight to the district and typically allows the expansion of charter schools, which already exist in the city.
The state was not supposed to lower any school districts’ accreditation statuses this month. According to the state’s school accountability structure, known as the Missouri School Improvement Plan, which is in its sixth iteration, school districts could see their accreditation change in January 2027 due to consistently low Annual Performance Report scores.
SLPS was on track to see its accreditation drop to provisional status next year.
However, board member Kerry Casey of Chesterfield evoked a rule in the MSIP 6 guidelines that allows the state school board to lower the district’s status due to failure to meet certain benchmarks set by the Department of Secondary and Elementary Education.
The board voted 6-1, with Pamela Westbrook-Hodges from Pasadena Hills in St. Louis County as the sole board member against the decision.
State Commissioner of Education Karla Eslinger spoke in support of the district and advised the board that dropping the district’s accreditation status shouldn’t be used as a punitive measure in response to the district’s late audit submission.
She said that she and representatives from the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education have been working closely with the district to help stabilize its academic and financial performance
Eslinger said that she did not give SLPS officials a heads up that the state board would discuss the district’s accreditation during Tuesday’s meeting.
“My position is, lower accreditation. Don’t lower accreditation. The provisional tag on the school district is not going to make that big of a difference as far as what they're doing next,” Eslinger said. “They’re not going to lose any funding. They already have charters in their district, so there's no expansion of charter (schools). What does it actually do?”According to a statement provided to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the school district said it plans to submit its annual financial audit by the end of the month.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
