Staff and students at Annapolis High already knew the school had problems. They just didn't know how bad they were.

But when the state released results of the new high school assessments two weeks ago, Annapolis High found itself ranked last in Anne Arundel County.

It had the lowest scores in three of five subject areas and was near the bottom in the other two.

"I think for a while we took things for granted," said Assistant Principal D. Vance Williams, who took part in an emergency faculty brainstorming session last week to address the test results. "Now the data sort of slaps us in the face."

The new assessments - the first time the state has attempted to measure overall student achievement in high schools - have prompted intense self-examination beyond Annapolis High.

At schools across Maryland, officials have spent hours poring over data and looking for weak points in instruction.

At Annapolis High, there had never been such a clear warning sign until the recent test. Many teachers, parents and students, however, say it was only a matter of time.

They say the low scores reflect the school's overall problems with discipline, morale and instruction.

Administrators say the school's past successes in some areas might have masked serious problems.

"In a school like this, it's easy to get comfortable," said Principal Joyce Smith, "because, by most measures of student achievement, we do really well."

High achievers

The school has nearly always scored above the national and state averages on the SAT. This year, it is offering 21 Advanced Placement courses - more than any other school in the county. Severna Park High, the county's top-scoring school, offers 17. Eighty percent of Annapolis High students who attempted AP exams in May passed them.

But because it is usually college-bound students who take AP courses or the SAT, such yardsticks do not reflect the entire student body, school officials say.

"To have a survey of our total population, it really focuses us," Smith said.

Annapolis High, which serves about 1,600 students, has one of the county's most diverse populations.

The area's educational woes aren't limited to the high school. Schools Superintendent Eric J. Smith has implemented back-to-basics reading and math curricula at all the elementary schools that feed into Annapolis High, which are among the county's lowest-scoring on standardized tests.

The high school offers several support programs that assist struggling students. One program targets those at risk of dropping out. Others help students who otherwise would not have taken honors classes or considered college.

Below average

Despite these efforts, the school scored below the county average in all subject areas tested by the state. The lowest score was in algebra, where the average student scored in the 30th percentile - as well as or better than 30 percent of students in Maryland. In government, the school's percentile rank was 36; biology, 40; English, 43; and geometry, 45.

The dismal results have prompted a burst of activity at the school. In the week after the results' release, administrators and teachers met nearly every day to discuss the data and plan a comeback.

Suggestions at an after-school brainstorming session included assigning experienced faculty members to teach assessed courses and offering scholarships to students who do well on the assessments.

One teacher volunteered to plaster school walls with motivational posters before the next assessments, which officials say many students didn't take seriously this time because they were required only to take, not pass, them.

Discipline problems

Some teachers, however, say there are pervasive problems at the school that can't be solved by short-term strategies aimed at boosting test scores. "The big thing is we have to have consistency as far as discipline," said science teacher Neill Russell. "All those other things are fluff to me."

Russell said he tries hard to motivate students. "I love teaching these kids," he said. "I show them fairness, and I care about them in sincerity."

But he said the apathy toward school that many of his students have developed makes it difficult for him to reach them. "We need help," he said. "We need the churches, community leaders."

English teacher Diana Peckham sees a lack of discipline and respect when she is on hall duty. "I have negative interactions with students who don't know me," Peckham said.

"They haven't recognized the distinction between what's expected behavior in school and what's expected when they're out in their community, with their friends."

Because that behavior trickles into the classroom, many teachers say, they often feel frustrated and helpless.

"I feel that we have less of a sense of power than we have ever had," said art teacher June Perry. "I almost feel the teachers should be petitioning for some sort of support from the school board."

Several students eating lunch in the school cafeteria recently agreed that many of their peers misbehave.

They said that it is partly because teachers are unwilling to crack down on the behavior.

"Some students are out of control," said 10th-grader Erica Lawrence. "They cut class and still get good grades. The teachers don't care. They just want them to pass the class and get out of their class."

Added Lawrence: "Everybody wants to come to Annapolis High because they think you can just do whatever you want."

A few tables away, junior Shermekia Collins said she feels some teachers don't take an interest in students. "They basically give us a worksheet or something [and say], 'Do it before class is over,'" she said.

Achievement gap

Parents and teachers say the school also faces a disparity in achievement between black and white students - an issue throughout the school system, but hammered home by the racial breakdown in Annapolis High's test results.

The white students at the school posted median percentile scores mostly in the 60s and 70s. The black students posted median percentile scores in the 20s and 30s. Blacks and whites each make up about 45 percent of the student body.

"I think Annapolis High prides itself on having so many opportunities for higher-echelon kids," said Odessa Ellis, who has two sons at the school. "I don't knock it. I'm happy. It's just that we don't have enough [black] kids in them."

Joyce Smith said one of the school's greatest challenges is its diversity, but also said that is one of the school's greatest assets. She said she doesn't think students lack discipline, but that they need more effective instruction to prepare for assessments.

"We're a lot better than those test scores show," she said. "We know that. We just now have to demonstrate that for everyone else."