The headline in the Times Union read, All but one of Duval’s “Intervene” Schools off lowest performing list. That should be great news right? Then why am I skeptical? First let me say I hate to be the bearer of bad news, it is so much more fun to pass out cigars and celebrate but I know all to well how Duval operates. They celebrate supposedly good news, occasionally even skewing data to force it upon us.
That’s why when I see that six of our schools are off the intervene list, instead of high fiving people questions pop into my mind. The first is, at these schools was there a precipitous drop in enrollment? Last year when Forrest went from an F to a C, what was lost in all the good news was their enrollment dropped by 300 students. Well friends if you get rid of your worse 300 students your grade is bound to go up. Sadly Forrest isn’t the only school where miracle gains occurred after enrolment dropped. I am concerned that instead of fixing our problems, we are just moving struggling kids around. It is like the county is playing a game of three card Monty with kid’s futures.
Then in high schools I wonder how many bonus points the schools received for forcing kids in advanced placement classes they have no business being in? If you didn’t know, schools get points just for placing bodies in those seats. Also let these two tidbits set in, Duval has the highest percentage of kids in these advance classes in the state and has the worse by far passing rate on AP tests in the state. I am skeptical about the reasons we put so many kids in these classes. Are we doing it to give them a leg up or are we doing it to get bonus points?
One final thing, the powers-that-be point to all the hard work by teachers and staff, well let me tell you hard work is not just a recent phenomenon, it has been going on all along but what has changed is schools didn’t used to get rid of kids that were performing poorly or force them into classes they shouldn’t be in.
So yes, lets acknowledge the hard work but lets delve behind the numbers before we have a parade.
Absolutely, Chris! High stakes bologna invites gaming the system and looking good becomes the game rather than doing good.
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