My Backyard

Posted by: Brian Hull in Education on February 04, 2010  

I wanted to follow up on Pat Crowley’s post referring to yesterday’s NECAP test scores that were released from the RI Dept. of Education.  As Pat correctly pointed out, the press release purposefully misstates the decline in math test scores for the majority of the state’s charter schools.  What I wanted to do is engage people in a theoretical exercise.

There’s a lot of talk about how horrible the state’s schools are, that we spend more money per pupil, but have lower student achievement, that public school teachers are the problem, and we need to move to a model where administrators have the “flexibility” to remove underperforming teachers.

Looking at the recent NECAP scores (with the full understanding that these scores cannot determine teacher quality in any meaningful way), we again get a clear picture of two very distinct school systems existing in the state.  There is a pretty consistent correlation between test scores and the wealth of a particular community.  The more wealthy a community is, the better the scores are; the poorer the community, the lower the scores.

This has been a truism for many, many year in the state, but is generally lost in the vitriolic denunciation of public school teachers that seems to permeate every dialogue even remotely related to education.

The five wealthiest communities in the state, based on median family income are: 

1. East Greenwich $90,221
2. Barrington $84,657
3. Jamestown $77,990
4. Exeter / West Greenwich $72,745
5. North Kingstown $69,559

The five poorest communities in the state, based on median family income are:

1. Central Falls $26,844
2. Providence $32,058
3. Woonsocket $38,353
4. Pawtucket $39,038
5. West Warwick $47,674

Schools in the five wealthiest communities have consistently higher student test scores than schools in the poorest five communities.  For example, students in Barrington’s elementary schools score between 89 and 94% proficient in reading and between 84 and 93% proficient in math.  In East Greenwich, elementary students score between 86 and 98% proficient in reading and between 85 to 95% proficient in math.

Conversely, in Central Falls, reading scores are between 46 and 73%, and math scores are between 41 and 66%.  In Providence elementary schools, students scored between 33 and 66% proficient in reading and 18 to 58% proficient in math.  The disparity in test scores holds true for middle schools and high schools as well.

Now this isn’t a debate between public and private schools, or public and charter schools.  This is a question of why certain public schools do consistently well, while other public schools have consistently poor outcomes?

I’ve heard a lot about the importance of teacher quality and teacher effectiveness (these are not mutually exclusive in my opinion).  I don’t deny that having a highly qualified and motivated teacher standing at the front of every classroom is extremely important.  Children should only go through each grade once, and that experience should be the best possible to ensure that they’re reaching their full potential.

My rhetorical question is – do all the highly qualified, motivated, and effective public school teachers only teach in Barrington, East Greenwich, and the other high performing schools in wealthy communities, leaving Providence, Central Falls, Woonsocket, etc. with “low quality” teachers?  

The answer, obviously, is a resounding no.  There are many, many factors that influence how effective even the best teacher can be in a classroom: age of text books, class size, stable home life, language barriers, poverty, hunger, community resources, previous student achievement, parental involvement, attitudinal or behavioral problems, special needs students, etc.

I just wish there was a more nuanced education reform policy that considered the multitude of different reasons why children may not be living up to their full potential, rather than basing everything on how kids are doing on certain tests.  Are there poor quality teachers?  Probably so.  And certainly, there are teachers that can be unprepared.  Should we continually improve teacher quality through professional development and lifelong educational training?  Yes.  

But my theoretical exercise would involve taking the entire teaching staff and school administration from Meadowbrook Farms Elementary School in East Greenwich (2009 proficiency = 98% in reading and 95% in math) and put them in Charlotte Woods Elementary School in Providence (2009 proficiency = 33% in reading and 26% in math).  I would like to see if they could achieve the same results in a vastly different school setting with a variety of additional challenges.