ROCK SPRINGS — A man involved in Sweetwater County School District No.1’s recent accreditation peer review had lofty praise for the district Monday evening.

Brent Young, a member of the Wyoming Department of Education team that visited the district said the team commends the work the district has accomplished in developing its comprehensive and systematic approach. The peer review visits take place every five years. Young said the group tries to keep its focus on the strengths of a district and review them on 14 different criteria. He said the review takes the team through the governance level, into administration, and into the classroom.

“It was evident during the review across all 14 review criteria that you demonstrate a very strong alignment between your governance, your leadership, your instruction, and your community engagement,” Young said.

The review team also highlighted the district’s collaborative leadership and culture, its instructional alignment and rigor, and its safe, inclusive and supportive learning environments. Young said the method for the reviews isn’t based on weighing good aspects with aspects that need improvement but is more focused on providing comments on what the team hopes to see.

“We try to give comments that you look at and say, ‘you know, we think we can leverage that,’” Young said.

Areas listed for leverage in the team’s report include developing long-term measures of success that ensure sustainability and demonstrate impact, implementing systems that track and analyze student participation, and broadening stakeholder engagement.

The accreditation visit took place in October, and the district previously issued a statement about the visit and highlighted comments made about the district’s progress.