Surprisingly, the Chickens come home to roost

Hey Folks -

The cultural myth-enforcers have been listening to themselves so long that when reality intrudes into their happy little world of make-believe they get all confused. Golly how can good, white, upper middle class schools POSSIBLY be ranked with or below the schools of the unwashed?

See their consternation displayed in the article directly below. My response to the reporter comes after that.

- Uke Man

Good schools failing feds' test
No Child downgrades some rated highly by state
Sunday, September 23, 2007
By Charlie BossTHE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

The state says Wright Elementary and Davis Middle School are high-performing.

However, under federal No Child Left Behind standards, these Dublin schools are not.

Now the district has to offer students the chance to go to a "better" school -- one where all students are successful.

Offering transfers when schools do poorly isn't new to urban schools. But rural and suburban schools have been largely untouched by the federal provisions.

"I was surprised," said Michele Compton, whose daughter is a seventh-grader at Davis. "Dublin is known for its excellent standards. When you see that, you're like, 'How can that be?' "

Schools are required to notify families of their choice options. Parents from both Dublin schools received letters last week and must notify administrators by Monday if they want a transfer.

Though Wright and Davis earned a B and A respectively on this year's state report card, some groups of students -- including those in special-education and those with limited English skills -- didn't do well on math and reading tests.

As a result, both landed on the federal "school-improvement list" -- schools that have failed for at least two years to make progress in reading and math tests.

Of 47 central Ohio schools new to the improvement list, 20 are in suburban and rural districts. And they include schools that received A's and B's in top-rated districts such as Big Walnut and Dublin.

An additional 32 schools are at risk and will have to offer transfers next year if they fail to meet targets. Half of those schools earned A's and B's this year.

All schools can be labeled for failing to meet federal goals for certain student subgroups -- which can be defined by race, gender, family income, disability status or other factors.

But buildings that get federal dollars for low-income students face consequences for continuing to miss targets.

Schools say they are working on improvement plans, adding staff members and creating after-school and mentoring programs so test-takers next spring will be ready. The challenge lies in following the federal sanctions and explaining the situation to parents, administrators said.

"The bottom line is, we are complying and we will comply," said Canal Winchester Superintendent Kimberley Miller-Smith. "We just need to have some of the regulations explained to us."

Districts such as Canal Winchester say the transfer option is not possible when there is only one building in the district that serves certain grades of students.

But Mitch Chester, who oversees testing and accountability for the state, said they can send students to high-performing neighboring districts or provide tutoring services for families.

He said charter schools, online schools and vouchers are options for parents.

Miller-Smith said administrators are still working on plans, including one that would allow parents at Indian Trail and Winchester Trail elementaries to attend higher-performing schools in a nearby district.

Both schools landed on the school-improvement list for failing to meet reading and math targets among four groups: black students, students with disabilities, the economically disadvantaged and limited-English speakers.

Tougher still is explaining how a school earning high marks from the state can get low marks under the federal standard, officials said.

"It's confusing to parents," said Paul Mathews, superintendent at Liberty Union-Thurston schools in Fairfield County. "At a certain point … it will become meaningless."

Liberty Union Elementary earned an A but must offer transfers because its special needs and low-income student groups missed goals.

Under the No Child Left Behind Act, schools must show progress until all students are successful in reading and math by 2013-14.mailto:2013-14.cboss@dispatch.com

Dear Mr. Boss,

As a long-standing critic of “Proficiency” testing and, more recently, the “No Child” approach, I’m not surprised that “good” schools are “failing to meet reading and math targets among four groups: black students, students with disabilities, the economically disadvantaged and limited-English speakers.”

The whole Ohio ‘proficiency” scheme is based on faulty notions. Testing was supposedly needed to tell where “bad” schools were so they could be improved; but we already knew where the “bad” schools were – i.e. where large groups of “black students, students with disabilities, the economically disadvantaged and limited-English speakers” were educated – i.e. where those suffering from socially, biologically, economically, and geographically inflicted deficits attend school.

Where the wealthier student population is economically segregated from the rest of us (as in suburban districts) there are only a handful of these “difficult” students compared to the large numbers in urban districts. Under the Ohio system, this small percentage of “failures” is statistically negligible. As a result – under the Ohio system – the schools we always knew were “good” remain “good,” and the schools we always knew were “bad” remain, pretty much, “bad” schools.

To put it another way, the Ohio system overlooks the “failure” of “black students, students with disabilities, the economically disadvantaged and limited-English speakers” unless they are in large groups, as in the “bad” urban districts. The Ohio system is statistically “fixed” so that influential, wealthy suburbanites feel good and disadvantaged urban districts, teachers, parents, and students are goaded into attempting miracles for thousands of students that suburban schools cannot achieve for their hundreds.

The only difference – under the Ohio approach – is that urban schools are held responsible for “failure,” while suburban schools are praised for excellence. The federal policy throws a monkey wrench into that. I find it instructive that those of us who criticized these schemes from the start as being unfair to urban districts and ill conceived have been ignored and negatively characterized. Now that the suburbs face the same problems, it’s a whole new ballgame.

I was astounded that the federal plan actually stuck to its false notion that ALL kids can achieve at the same high levels. I mistakenly expected that they would avoid the coming political storm (hinted at by the headline of your story). More surprising, though, was the apparently ignorant failure to anticipate that its policy would cause such a reaction (remember “busing” and how it never touched the suburbs?).

So, now the basic contradictions are coming to the fore. Whatever the testing programs actually are and do, they are not (and, by the force of wealthy districts, will not be) to address the needs of “black students, students with disabilities, the economically disadvantaged and limited-English speakers”; and they definitely won’t be allowed to make “good” suburban schools look "bad" for much longer.

Clearly, what is happening now as a result of “No Child” policy inadvertently demonstrates the hypocrisy and fallacy of the entire testing approach.

- Tom Harker