I think
Jacksonville’s reflexive response is to lie, contort or exaggerate accomplishments
while at the same time glossing over problem and limitations. It really is a sad
state of affairs.
Take for
example the Jacksonville Children Commission’s annual report, specifically what
they wrote about their after school program Team Up.
Before I
get started let me say I like Team Up. I think it is a great and vital program
that does a lot of good. Now let me bash the crap out of it,
They reported,
Middle
School TEAM UP participants had a 7% better attendance rate than
non-participants. 97.2% of participants were promoted to the next grade,
compared to 93.1% of non-participants.
http://www.coj.net/departments/special-services/docs/childrens-commission/32464-cyfa-report-web.aspx
At my school kids that are well behaved were
recruited to go to Team Up. You know the same kids that are more likely to
attend and be promoted. We didn’t want kids in our team up program that were
behavior problems, you know the ones that miss more days and sometimes don’t
advance and you can be damn sure if it happened at my school it happened at lots
of schools across the district and to be honest I don’t think that is unreasonable.
If you are going to be at school for an additional two hours do you want to be
with kids who listen and make an effort or kids that don’t care and are
disrespectful. Maybe the second group needs the help more but that makes for an
incredibly long day.
Why didn’t the JCC just say we served so many
children who did so many amazing things? Why did they feel the need to throw
stats in that I saw and instantly knew to be skewed?
Now I have to question everything they put out and
so should you.
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