This week’s news

I am trying to find a way to keep the blog current without too much eye strain. Here’s my latest idea. I will collect links and put them in categories. If you are interested, just click on the link. If you come across a story somewhere else. Please send the link.

Today the topic is school facilities funding cuts creating chaos.

Chicago’s south side schools falling apart

Massive charter closure in Ohio

How well do Florida students do….Really?

At the Florida House Innovation hearing a couple of weeks ago, Commissioner Stewart said that Florida ranked in the top ten in achievement scores. This is a stretch. Try 11th in fourth grade reading and 33nd in eighth grade reading. It  is worse in mathematics.

The comparisons of Florida on the National Achievement of Education Progress (NAEP) average scores are reported below along with the achievement gains in scores from 2003-2015.

AVERAGE SCORES

  1. Nationally Florida is 11th in grade four reading and 19th in math on NAEP, but it is one of the relatively few states that has mandatory third grade retention based on state assessment scores. Retention of third graders creates a temporary inflation in scores for fourth graders. Fourth grade NAEP scores diminish by eighth grade.
  2. Florida’s ranking in 8th grade reading drops to 33nd. Math is 43rd. nationwide.

Grade 4
Compare: Florida Nation Rank
Math……. 243… 200… 19
Reading.. 227… 221… 11

Grade 8
Math……. 275… 281… 43
Reading.. 263… 264… 33

COMPARISONS WITH LARGE ‘MEGA’ STATES

The Florida DOE does compare Florida’s NAEP scores to the nation and to other large states like California, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio and Texas. Of these so-called mega states, only California, Ohio and Florida have mandatory third grade retention. Note the drop in Florida’s percentage of students scoring at or above proficient in achievement rankings between fourth and eighth grade. The gain in the percentages of students scoring at or above proficient between 2003-15 is included in the report.

  1. All of the mega states except California out perform Florida in 8th grade mathematics. In reading, California and Texas have lower scores than Florida, but Florida also has a below average percentage of students scoring at or above the proficiency level.
  2. Florida’s 8th grade achievement gains in reading were less than all other large states except New York. California and Pennsylvania had large reading gains. The only large state to have large achievement gains in mathematics was Texas. Florida had significantly lower gains than most large states.

Education Week reports Quality Indicators that combine a number of ratings. If the National Assessment score rankings in grade 4 and 8 are used, Florida’s quality indicator is a C-, according to the latest Education Week report.

The bottom line is:

  1. Large states with large minority and low income populations do not perform as well as other states.
  2. Eighth grade scores are better indicators of achievement than are fourth grade scores due to differences in states’ retention policies.
  3. Florida ranks near the bottom in achievement gains. Wish it were different. Florida cannot improve achievement if it does not even recognize the problem it has.

Separate and Unequal Destruction

Schools of Hope is the latest panacea in Florida for economically and racially segregated schools.  Low performing schools can either be closed or turned into charters.  These charters, called Schools of Hope would be run by charters like KIPP that operate no-nonsense schools in low income areas.  Students who survive the harsh discipline policies can do well.  The others, often as many as forty percent of students, are counseled  to leave school.  What happens to these students?

 

 

 

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Florida Gets an ‘F’ Again

FAILED1Which states get it right?  Not Florida.  It was one of eight states that received an overall grade of ‘F’ when its grades were averaged across the categories studied.   The Network for Public Education rated states based on six criteria.

For each category, I combined the percentages of A, B and C grades received across states.  I was surprised at the results.  Relatively few states (11) use test scores to punish students and teachers, but Florida is one of those that do.  You can see the combined percentages (think of them as passing scores) at the end of each of the criteria.

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Is More Truly Better?

After 15 years of school choice, have we learned how to help disadvantaged children?  The achievement gap remains. A year of school produces a year’s worth of learning.  Children who lack kindergarten readiness skills must somehow learn faster just to catch up. Yes, access to high quality preschool programs is needed, but for children already in school, is more school better? Continue reading