No one can nor should ignore Ohio schools' widespread improvement on the Local School Report Cards. It is heartening to see 13 local districts improve their ratings, 16 earn "excellent" designations, and student achievement rise in all grades tested across the state.

What is more heartening, however, is that there is order and method to this improvement. Schools aren't only doing better but apparently know why they're doing better and how to replicate it.

Doing the basics well

The job of improving public education in Ohio isn't finished, but it is clearly under way, and the reasons boil down to basic things, well done. The state has developed standards that, while not perfect, are generally seen as more rigorous and growing stronger, and schools have gotten serious about aligning their curricula to those standards.

Schools have become far more sensible about tracking their progress, relying more heavily on data to determine what students are learning, who's not learning and how to fill in the gaps. Finally, schools are putting more resources into early intervention rather than waiting to remediate.

Those efforts make sense, and we applaud them. But are there cautions along the way? Absolutely.

The strength of test-driven standardization is that it sets goals and measures progress. Ohio has come a long way in articulating what it wants students to know and be able to do, and if they've mastered it. But when state curricula and state tests carry that much weight - when they are driving learning to that extent - states must keep revisiting the question of whether they are measuring the right things.

So how do they know? One way is to concentrate on critical thinking skills - the ability to reason, analyze, make decisions, arrive at sound conclusions - rather than simply the acquisition of information. Ohio's proficiency tests and the new Ohio Graduation Test do focus on those skills, but there are other measures as well.

More good signs needed

If Ohio students are really doing better in things that count, we could expect to see some increase in composite SAT and ACT scores (although they're affected by how many students take the exams) or Advanced Placement exams, perhaps more National Merit designees, or better performance on other achievement tests. It would help to know if fewer graduates need remediation in college, for example, or if more are applying at more rigorous colleges.

The indicators can vary, but the point is, if achievement is climbing substantially, signs of it should be breaking out all over.

But, quantifiable progress aside, we must admit everything good can't be summed up in a number. When we ask how Ohio students are doing, we should also mean: are they happy? Are teachers and parents still seeing creativity? Are children learning to work together, serve others, have a passion for something?

We admit we don't know how to communicate those things on a Local Report Card, but we do know they matter. Excellent schools not only instruct, they inspire.