15 out of 21 systems reach targets; Hoover district falls short

[walkon]

At what point will this be called for the fraud that it is? Will educators just continue to play along? At their own peril?

http://www.al.com/education/birminghamnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1123838642259410.xml&coll=2&thispage=2

snip

Schools and school systems are required to improve each year over the previous year. The No Child Left Behind law compares a school's or school system's performance year to year, not to other schools or systems.

Because the results for systems and individual schools are calculated with different formulas, a system can pass even if many schools in that system don't meet their goals - or a system can fail even if most of its schools do well.

snip

Some schools struggle with certain groups, said Sherry Vanderver, accountability coordinator for the Midfield schools. For example, almost all special education students must take the test appropriate for their chronological grade level - even if an eighth-grader is reading on a third-grade level.

"Expectations are very, very high, and we need to be quite realistic about what we're going to accomplish in such a short period of time," she said.

[jody]

1. Alabama's K-12 system is a failure and the Department of Education

doesn't have a clue how to improve education. Analysis of state data shows that the amount of money spent per student does not have a significant effect on test scores. That same data also shows that schools with a high percentage of free school lunches, a surrogate indicator of poverty, is highly negatively correlated with low test scores, test scores go down as the percentage of free lunches goes up. That single factor explains perhaps 60-70% of low test scores.

All the BS published by the Dept of Education ignores a few simple facts. Every single minute of every K-12 class day is already filled to capacity. The question then is (a) what new material will be taught and what eliminated or (b) what new teaching techniques will be used to improve the teaching process? None of Alabama's education experts can answer those two questions and the elected State Board of Education won't press the issue.

In the meantime, local education systems continue to waste scarce funds, e.g. the Montgomery School System recently approved spending about $200 thousand to hire three PR hacks to tell the public what a good job the new school superintendent is doing.

With leaders like we have, we are doomed to continue being among the worst states regarding K-12 education --- but we have excellent football teams.

[BamaLefty]

2. Excellent Football Teams

Rock on. That's all that really matters. Let Massachusetts and Oregon have the geeks in this world!

20 days until kickoff! ;)

[Syrinx]

3. article in Sunday's Birmingham News says Hoover High is doing quite well

It says Hoover's average ACT score is 23.1, compared to the national average of 20.9. On the SAT, 1,180 versus 1,026 nationally. That 96% of graduates go to college. And that 39% of seniors are offered scholarships.

http://www.al.com/news/birminghamnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1124011394247770.xml&coll=2

[LizW]

4. NCLB is a set up

The way the scoring is done sets schools and systems up to be labeled "failing". For instance, children in special ed, and children who don't speak English are required to be given the same test as other children in their grade level. They receive no accomodation at all. Of course they don't score well. If a school or a system has over 40 children in these categories, and those children don't meet the arbitrary goals, the whole school or the whole system is called "failing". Systems like Mountain Brook and Vestavia don't have enough children in these groups, so they don't count if they "fail". System-wide, Hoover is much more diverse, so they get a "fail" in those special ed and ESL areas. The way the scoring works, if you get a "fail" in even one block of the grid, the whole system is labeled a "failure".

NCLB is a fraud. The whole purpose is to promote the meme that public schools aren't doing a good job, and should lose federal funding.

This is my 9th year to have children in Hoover schools. I'm very pleased. It's not perfect, but the teachers and administrators we have had have been great. The challenges to the school system are getting bigger all the time, but I wouldn't want my kids anywhere else.

[Frances]

5. Great explanation of NCLB

If Bush can convince the majority of all Americans (not just parents which would be much harder to do) that public schools are failures, he can then get rid of them by taking away their funding and giving it to private schools in the form of vouchers. The private/religious schools can then feed Repub propaganda to the the children of America.