Monday, July 19, 2010

Get your school board tickets here ...

In another reminder that things could always be crazier, the News & Observer's T. Keung Hui reports that people will be lining up in the heat to get tickets to the Wake County's school board meeting Tuesday, or trying to squeeze into overflow space.

Protests continue over that board's recent decision to toss out a student assignment plan that promoted economic diversity in schools. Bear in mind that all this is going on while Wake launches a search for a new superintendent.

By contrast, Charlotte-Mecklenburg's ongoing study of student assignment, which resumes this week, seems serene.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ann, what time are the test scores going to be released?

BTW we need a new super too!

Ann Doss Helms said...

Test score release is 2 p.m. at Gov Center.

Anonymous said...

I suspect that there are some in Charlotte who would love to have a 60's style protest ("civil disobedience and all")here, just like they're going to have in Raleigh tomorrow.

Anonymous said...

The N&O article features the differences brought on by the influx of northern segregationalists and the issues that Charlotte has already been through. This will certainly be interesting viewing the state's new largest county school system in turmoil while Bev concentrates on the highway patrol and illegal campaign flights. I'm sure that the Wake BOE can find a TFA principal to bring the pesky low achievers into compliance with a golden parachute waiting at the end of a rainbow.

Anonymous said...

I suspect that your suspicions are incorrect. Most people are weary of all of the fighting and would like to enjoy their neighborhood school.

But if that means an inferior eduction because of sucky admin with low expectations, then you can forget it.

Don't want the protests and rhetoric? Then tell Pete to do his job and get quality principals in ALL schools, not just the wealthy ones.

Anonymous said...

What do you mean by "northern segregationists"? If someone opposes busing and would like their child to attend school close to home does that make them a segregationist?

Anonymous said...

1:48 Yep, that is the mindset of the simpletons NAACP and others herd along (sheep). They lack the intellectual ability and maturity to debate the subject, just ignore the facts.

Anonymous said...

Ann, I am sure you are digesting the numbers now. Something odd about the Physics .541 growth coefficient. It's more than double any of the other EOC's and over 5x that of Alg2. The beta on that seems way too high, and the numbers are consistently high at EVERY school, even at schools that struggled with it in prior years. It also looks like the small schools (Garringer and Olympic) showed tremendous gains, far exceeding CMS avgs in both growth and proficiancy % gains. However, if memory served, they were the two schools who lost the most teachers at the end of this school year. Something odd about that? Why does that seem strange to me? Any thoughts Ann?

Anonymous said...

The term segregation is substituted for separate and not equal based on many factors as described in the N&O article. Attending a school close to your home is no guarantee of anything in Charlotte and I certainly agree with the assertion of preference for school proximity. But now that CMS has become "urban" what if a parent on the West or East side wants his student to attend a perceived quality school? Equality in facilities, instruction, staff, and student preparedness will always vary leaving "choice" to those with "a deluxe apartment in the sky." Anon 1:30 is certainly correct in placing quality principals in position and allowing them to hire and lead instead of depending on HR to get in the way of building a strong staff with new hires from Orange County, Florida who are just passing through. It's just ironic that this is happening in DPI's backyard and representative of the continuing slide of higher education in NC.

Anonymous said...

Ann you have to love your job! I will study these scores until the cows come home.

Question. Why doesn't the district publish AP and IB pass rates? I would like to know how IB students are fairing across the district. Which programs are effective and which ones are ineffective.

Are IB students actually receiving IB diplomas or are they just in the program treading water?

Happy number crunching!

Donna said...

Slightly OT, but IB and AP pass rates are not the only measure of success in those programs. Longitudinal studies of student who participate in AP classes show that even students who get a 1 or a 1 on the AP tests (or who do not take the tests at all) perform better at college than those from similar backgrounds who did not challenge themselves with AP tests. If we let the schools set the bar high, and encourage as many kids as possible into AP/IB style classes, kids will benefit.

Ann Doss Helms said...

Easy one first: They do release AP/IB results, but that comes at a different time. September maybe? No time to check clips because I'm going to have to dash to a board session soon.

Ann Doss Helms said...

Anon 7:22, great questions that I can't answer yet. CMS started dumping data on us at 2 p.m., so I was running hard to crank out the overview yesterday. Today will be eaten by the student assignment review sessions. Hope to take a close look at test data after that.

On physics, my one thought is that participation has narrowed greatly, so now it's more the top-tier students taking it (the CMS pendulum on physical science has swung back; for awhile almost no one offered it, and now that's more commonly taken by kids who aren't necessarily aspiring to a 4-year college that would require physics).

I'm eager to take a closer look at Olympic and Garinger. You typically see bigger swings with smaller groups, so each campus's five "mini schools" might tend to see higher highs and lower lows. But Olympic folks have been talking for weeks about great success, so I want to know more.

Anonymous said...

Weird that it takes them that long to get AP scores back. Scores were delivered to teachers and students this past week!! So I would have to assume the AP coordinators at all the CMS schools have the info... hmmmm..