Insufferable Portland Tribune columnist Promise King yesterday called Jefferson High School "an academic embarassment to the district", and called for the superintendent "to close this nonperforming school and rescue its students from academic underachievement."
He also seemed to question the viability of public education:
"This is the time to ask hard questions about how the district will bring about academic achievement for all its students.
"My question is, do we still believe public education best serves our collective interest? Let me know."
Since he's asking for my opinion, here it is:
Since the 1995-96 school year, the four wealthiest and whitest high schools in the district have increased enrollment by an average of nearly 10%, while the four poorest and most ethnically diverse have suffered enrollment declines ranging from 19% (Madison) to 38% (Jefferson).
Jefferson, with a 12% white enrollment, actually has far better test scores than Roosevelt (41% white), which has also experienced a catastrophic loss of students-- about 34% since 1995-6. Marshall (55% white) fares little better in a comparison of test scores. It too has lost a hefty percentage of students since 1995-6 -- 28%. So why single out Jefferson as a district "embarrassment"? Why not Roosevelt or Marshall?
The three middle schools--Green, Tubman, and Whitaker-- that feed into Jefferson are burdened with low test scores. The percentage of 8th graders from the three schools who meet or exceed benchmarks in reading and math average 41% and 34%, respectively. Lincoln's middle school feeder, West Sylvan, has 8th grade proficiency rates of 91% and 92% Scores for 10th graders, as is typical throughout the district (and the state), drop for both Jefferson and Lincoln. One could argue, however, since many of the higher scoring students from Jefferson's feeder schools probably choose to attend Grant or Benson, that Jefferson is actually doing a better job of educating its students than Lincoln. Based on test scores, it's educational program is certainly superior to Wilson's, the second wealthiest high school in the district. The 8th grade proficiency percentages of Wilson's feeders (Gray and Jackson) average slightly over 80% for both reading and math. Wilson's 10th graders drop off dramatically to 57% and 67%, respectively. Now that's an embarassing "performance".
Of course, I don't agree that you can draw any conclusions about schools by looking at test scores, especially without considering student demographics. It's clear--crystal clear, if you look at the data-- that a powerful correlation exists between student performance on standardized tests and school demographics, including poverty, ethnicity, and the number of non-English speaking and learning disabled students.
On the other hand, school enrollment data does suggest, at least to me, that the district's school choice policy may be directly responsible for the apparent migration of students from poor schools to wealthier ones. That, in turn, accounts in large part for the dismal overall test perforrmance of students left behind in poverty-ridden schools, as I have written on several occasions. The precipitous enrollment decline in Portland over the past two years, in large part, can also be attributed to school choice, along with the misleading use of terms on "school report cards" like "unsatisfactory" and "failing" (and the media's favorite-- "underperforming") to characterize schools with low test scores.
Even the district's "best" high school, Lincoln (81% white, over 80% of 10th graders meeting or exceeding reading and math benchmarks), has failed to meet federal Adequate Yearly Progress standards for its handful of economically disadvantaged, Black, and Hispanic students. By the terms of No Child Left Behind, it too is a failing school. Just like Jefferson and Roosevelt. And all of the other high schools in Portland.
If Promise King, like the ideologues who concocted No Child Left Behind, believes that a privatized education system can do a better job educating kids--and that means all kids-- than the publicly funded common schools that you and I attended, he ought to just come out and say so. And let the debate begin, openly, without the politics and the subterfuge surrounding federal, state, and local educational policies.
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