Posted on 07/23/2012 2:33:00 PM PDT by MichCapCon
The problem with measuring school districts has always been the trouble of making "apples-to-apples" comparisons for student achievement.
For example, it is well-known that the students attending Detroit Public Schools have a low high school graduation rate and have scored poorly on standardized tests. But are these poor results because of the teachers and administrators in those schools? Or because the students being tested are from low-income households?
For a long time, citizens and policymakers in Michigan have had a hard time knowing how well schools are actually educating their students. Until now.
The Mackinac Center for Public Policy has released its “Michigan Public High School Context and Performance Report Card” or “CAP.” The CAP Report Card examines public high school performance while taking into account family income, producing an “apples-to-apples” comparison for parents and policymakers.
"Education research consistently shows that socioeconomic factors have a significant impact on standardized test results," said Michael Van Beek, the Center’s director of education policy and co-author of the report card. "This is the first-of-its-kind attempt in Michigan to take this reality into account, and it helps us identify outstanding schools that by most measures would appear mediocre."
In short, the CAP Report Card takes Michigan Merit Exam and ACT test scores and adjusts them based on the percentage of students in the school who qualified for free or reduced-price lunch. A "CAP Score" indicates how far above and below expectations a high school performed based on the socioeconomic status of its student population. If the CAP Score for a school was above 100 the school exceeded the statewide average; if below 100, the school fell short.
For example, students at Star International Academy, a charter school in Dearborn Heights, score around the state average on tests. But since about 90 percent of the school’s students are from low-income households, the CAP Score for the school is 140.8 — the highest in the state.
At the other end of the scale are many high schools in the Detroit Public Schools system. Of the 35 public high schools in Detroit, 25 received D's or F's, which means they score among the lowest 20 percent of schools.
Of the top 6 best-performing high schools, four were charter schools and two were public schools that can selectively choose their students. The top-performing conventional public high school in the state was North Huron School. To see a list of the top 20 best-performing high schools, click here. To see a list of the top 25 best-performing conventional high schools, click here.
More than half of the top 20 worst-performing high schools were in Detroit, as well as five of the top six. Six of the 20 worst performers were charter schools. To see a list of the 20 worst-performing high schools, click here. To see a list of the 25 worst-performing conventional high schools, click here.
"The CAP Report Card has useful information for everyone," Van Beek said. "It will enable parents to make informed school choice decisions, provide school officials with a better assessment of their school's performance, and help policymakers identify high-performing schools and practices in an area that makes up the largest single state expenditure."
Jonathan Mills and Daniel Bowen of the University of Arkansas co-authored the study with Van Beek. The full report card and a fuller explanation of the study is available online at www.mackinac.org/CAP.
Focus on what a student knows or doesn’t know is the only way to really measure the school system. Making adjustments for income or anything else is just building failure into the system.
Someday there will be mandatory lobotomies for anyone who scores over 100 on an IQ test.
This is where America is headed in the age of Obama. Nothing matters anymore except the class warfare and destroying our great country.
So you get extra points if you are stupid and poor?
Sounds like someone who got those kinda points thunk up this idea
Adjusted grades in school doen’t mean adjusted opportunities when school is out.
Their grades may fool a potential employer, but when their grades aren’t matched by performance, they will find themselves out of a job, and the employer stuck paying unemployment for another idiot.
I am beginning to think “Idiocracy” was a documentary, not a comedy
The double standard has become the National Standard, in nearly ALL things. Sex deviates, Minorities, Women, etc. are not asked to attain the same levels of competence in testing that white Christian males do, just to make it APPEAR that there are no differences.
An economic adjustment? Why not let’s just be honest and make it a lazy or non present parent adjustment. That’s what it comes down to.
Teaching kids starts at home with the parents. This is where responsibility begins.
Does this mean that Gross Point High will be spotted three touchdowns whenever they play a Detroit inner city school?
Did it ever occur to these morons that some kids are just stupid. Or, maybe they’re just not willing to put up the effort to get good grades. I mean, why should they when the government can steal the fruit of other peoples’ labor and give it to them. If they don’t need to know anything to survive, then why should they even attempt to succeed?
I teach at public school in a city environment, 95% black.
The prospective student has to write a paper explaining why they want to attend this particular school and detail what they are bringing to the table. To attend, the student has to pass a basic skills exam. They have to have a teacher/administrator interview before acceptance.
A parent/guardian has to take time off work and attend the interview with the kid to get them in.
SURPRISE! We’re ranked in the top 10 schools. Over 90% go to college/military/trade employment.
It’s about the kids knowing that someone cares at home. It’s about knowing that if a teacher calls home about a behavior/grade issue, that’s a whuppin’. Oh and we can “uninvite” kids that don’t keep up the grade/behavior to get rid of the bad apples, should the need arise. (It’s not frequent but far from unheard of.)
Amazing what happens when folk care about their own and negative consequences are enforced.
Hell, even the fights are one on one and weaponless.
I understand, it's a way of saying if the student's are poor the school system can't be held accountable for poor scores on standardized tests.
It takes the focus off of what the student knows and says poorly performing schools are really okay if there students are financially poor.
An inner-city school where the average IQ of the students is 80 will not produce National Merit Scholarship winners at the same rate of a school where the average student IQ is 120.
Totally agree with your comments.
75% illegitimacy rate among blacks.
We expect the schools to fix it?
My daughter teaches 3rd grade in a suburb, only 40% of her students are from an intact family (birth mother and father living together with child). Imagine what it’s like in an inner city school.
"We're gonna take you back, to the year 1939 when Charlie Chaplin and his Nazi regime enslaved Europe and tried to take over the world... ...But then an even greater force emerged, the "UN"! And the "UN" un-nazied the world - forever."
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