Our schools get a poor national report card
A sobering download of data from The Education Trust makes clear that Washington schools are mired in mediocrity, and the WASL is not helping matters
There was a lot of wisdom — which she pointed out a couple times looked a lot like common sense — in the data Kati Haycock, president of The Education Trust, presented to the League of Education Voters in a speech at the downtown Seattle Library Monday night. It was not good news for our state.
The Education Trust is a highly respected nonprofit out of Washington, D.C., which “promotes high academic achievement for all students at all levels,” skillfully mining education’s trove of data to support its policy recommendations. Haycock was keynote speaker for an LEV event designed to thank the troops who helped pass the new basic education act, ESHB 2261, and energize them for the years of trench warfare ahead to fund and keep the promises only outlined so far.
The story Haycock tells with her PowerPoint graphs is profound. Nationally, elementary and middle school achievement is rising and the achievement gap closing — but not in Washington State. High schools: not so good anywhere. You can find it all linked from this LEV page: this LEV page or at The Education Trust web page.
Here are a few points worth keeping in mind:
1. Remedial courses (some would call them “dumbed-down”) for kids who enter high school unprepared (some might call them “at risk”) aren’t the best way to keep these kids in school, giving them a shot at graduation. Not at all. Haycock’s data show that these kids are more likely to stay in school when challenged by placement in rigorous academic classes just like everyone else. To that, the ghost of the late Mike Riley, former superintendent in Bellevue and a huge advocate of expanding use of the Advanced Placement curriculum, would whisper, “Told you so.” Haycock’s explanation: It gives them something to strive for.
This finding is a reminder of something common in education: the systemic under-valuing of kids’ intelligence. This pattern hits all kids, as every parent knows, but is worse for kids of class and color different from their teachers, as Haycock’s data demonstrated once again.
2. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is a better test than the WASL. That’s because the WASL lies to us. It lets us think we’re better than we are. The NAEP is administered to statistically valid populations of students all over the country and the results tell us how Washington compares nationally. It’s not pretty. For example, the WASL claims that in 2007 65 percent of African American fourth graders were proficient readers. But the 2007 NAEP results find only 20 percent met the standard of proficiency set by the federal government. The figures for white kids were 82 percent on the WASL and 41 percent on the NAEP.
Compared to other states, Washington tends to fall in the middle third of scores nationally on the NAEP tests. Problem is, with the WASL, we’re setting our own finish line. It’s as though in the 100-yard dash our children’s times were taken when they passed 80 yards. We’d have a better picture of how our kids were doing if state Schools Superintendent Randy Dorn just took the money Washington spends on the WASL and paid the Department of Education to give the NAEP to all our fourth- and eighth-grade students. That would be real WASL reform.
3. Among the current (and valid) big issues in education is the hue and cry and hope for a quality teacher in every classroom. One of Haycock’s graphs showed that Washington has a long way to go to get there. In this state, one fourth of all academic classes grades 7-12 are taught by teachers with neither a college major or certification in the subject they are teaching. That's fourth worst in the country, ahead of only Arizona, Alaska, and Louisiana — an uncanny factoid showing again that John McCain, Sarah Palin, and Bobby Jindal have a lot in common. Not something we in Washington should want to share.
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Comments:
Posted Wed, May 20, 11:15 a.m. inappropriate
Compared to other states, Washington tends to fall in the middle third of scores nationally on the NAEP tests.
Well, considering that Washington state is something like 49th out of the 50 states in terms education spending per student, that performance isn't so bad.
Imagine what our kids could accomplish if we actually spent on them what they're worth.
Posted Wed, May 20, 1:04 p.m. inappropriate
The title of the article should read – “OUR PARENTS GET A POOR NATIONAL REPORT CARD”
Education starts at home.
Posted Wed, May 20, 1:30 p.m. inappropriate
Washington is not 49th out of 50 states in education spending.
According to the most recent data available from the U.S. Department of Education, Washington actually ranks 28th in per pupil expenditures, when capital costs are included, and 35th when only operating expenses are counted. These figures are for 2004-05, and do not include the 28% increases in education spending the legislature enacted since then. (Certainly these large increases in funding have not resulted in significant improvements to student learning in the meantime.) The following facts give a true picture of education spending:
Each year Washington spends more than $9,500 per student, more than at any time in state history, adjusted for inflation.
This amounts to $237,500 for a classroom of 25 students for a nine-month year. Even if the teacher's salary were $100,000, all the rest would be available for administration and special programs.
As it is, less than 59 cents of every education dollar reaches the classroom.
Over 35 years, the number of students grew 25%, while the number of public school employees grew 77%.
The majority of public education employees are not classroom teachers.
Public schools may not hire just any qualified person to teach. Only people holding a state-approved certificate are allowed. None of the 5,000 people being laid off at Microsoft can teach in a public school, although private schools will be able to hire these talented individuals.
Less than 36% of 8th graders have achieved grade-level proficiency in math and reading on the NAEP, the national "gold-standard" for assessing student achievement.
About one-third of public high school students fails to graduate from high school.
Over half (52 percent) of students entering community or technical colleges have to take remedial math, English or reading courses to catch up. 37 percent of stduents entering our two-year and four-year collegs must take remedial math or English courses.
Taxpayers are providing public school administrators with ample funding--over $9 billion a year to educate one million students.
President Obama has announced a new era of responsibility. Our public schools are failing to prepare our students for college and the workplace. Responsibility and results, not endless requests for more money, is exactly what taxpayers, parents and students have a right to expect from the folks who run our public schools.
Posted Wed, May 20, 8:50 p.m. inappropriate
I had aclass assignment to interview somebody I knew. So, I interviewed my son about the WASL. I asked him how the tests could be better. He said the WASL his 5th grade class took could be harder, the problems more complex, and he didn't see the test as a big disruption.
I'm lucky, but my son is not lucky, works at it.
My sample of one tells me we are wastingour money on the current test.
Posted Thu, May 21, 7:59 a.m. inappropriate
1. It would not make sense to replace the state test with NAEP. NAEP doesn't provide individual student scores because no student takes the whole test (only 2 25-minute blocks out of 8 to 14 blocks). NCLB requires individual student scores.
2. The federal government has set two different standards for "proficiency" -- one for NCLB (2004), and one for NAEP (1990). The NCLB proficent standard starts at about the C-/C level or meets grade level expectations. The NAEP proficient standard starts about the B+/A- level or masters challenging subject matter (including some above grade level subject matter). The state must use the NCLB standard for the state test go received federal education dollars. It just doesn't make sense to compare the 65% OR 82% who scored C- or higher with the 20% or 41% who scored B+ or higher.
Posted Thu, May 21, 11:38 a.m. inappropriate
An excellent commentary on the state of schools. Particularly on the issue of accepting a policy that remedial classes consisting of lower expectations actually help. They only remove the non performer from seeing what effort, dedication and higher standards. can achieve. The public and their kids seem to comprehend the outrageous salaries, work ethic and high performance in professional sports. The best players are idolized and every kid wants to be a winner and works hard to achieve the very best they can. Kids in remedial classes have no winners to watch. Remedial classes remove the concept of achieving a goal.
On the other side of the coin in non segregated classrooms where curriculum and teaching is tailored to the non achiever, capable students aren’t challenged and suffer when classwork and classroom order is focused on those who have little desire to learn or are disruptive.
Which brings us to other issues in the article. Tests in general. Learning to take tests and achieve high scores are are as much the learned skill of test taking as they are a measure of achievement or intelligence. There are brilliant kids who are poor test takers as have been some of the most acclaimed names in science and invention. Taken by themselves tests should never be used as an indicator for making any kind of decision especially where to focus resources.
What makes a lot of sense are the two sentences that appear in the related stories block associated with this story. They read “It isn’t racism that’s oppressing Seattle Public Schools, it’s inflexibility.” And a second line -- “The most successful schools set high standards and make adjustments when something doesn't work.”
You can’t design a test that measurers either of these statements or the fact that the ratio of teachers to administrators over the last two decades has shifted if favor of administrators over teachers.
Posted Fri, May 29, 8:39 a.m. inappropriate
Livfinne: "None of the 5,000 people being laid off at Microsoft can teach at a public school..."
And there's a good reason for that: They aren't *teachers*! However talented they may be in programming or whatever they did at Microsoft, they should have to demonstrate a basic proficiency in the the field of teaching before they can actually be hired as teachers. Why is that so offensive an idea to some people? If you recognize the importance of teaching and you can agree with the concept that you get what you pay for, then it should be easy enough to agree that we should pay more for better teachers.
I think the current criticism of public education stems from a combination of a hearty disrespect for the profession of teaching, a chronic avoidance of paying a fair price for what you want, and an unwarranted belief that a private, for-profit alternative will magically deliver something for nothing. All of these factors are symptomatic of the self-indulgent, childlike mentality predominant in our voting public. Until they collectively grow up, the current situation will not change.
Posted Fri, Jun 12, 11:59 a.m. inappropriate
livfinne makes a common mistake by confusing "average" with "typical". While the state may spend, on average, $9,500 per student, that doesn't mean that the state spends that much on a typical student. The state spends a lot of money to educate a students with disabilities and much less on typical students. So that hypothetical classroom of 25 with a budget of $237,500 doesn't exist anywhere, let alone "on average".
They say that there are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics. The focus on a meaningless number like average spending per student and the deceptive extrapolation of that number to a classroom is a transparent effort to misinform. I know that I can't stop livfinne and others of that ilk to stop lying. All I ask is that if you're going to tell lies that you tell better ones. A lie this transparent is insulting.