New Great Schools Scores Ranking System

[karinothing]

Has anyone heard about this? My local schools message board is so mad. Great schools now takes into account the whether all students are being served. Meaning they take into account he performance of low income students (and a variety of other factors). Essentially they factor in the achievement gap. All the top rated high schools here took mega hits. It is amusing to see folks freaking out about it. I am sure it won't change much, but maybe schools will hear from angry rich parents about how their failings related to low income students are now affecting their property values and they will start to do better.

[andwhat]

So it is going to be a little more realistic and not flat out racist? Of course the rich parents are angry. Where I live has high property value and the local schools are low rated, which is not an accurate reflection of many of the schools.

ETA: My local school actually went up.

[katieinthecity]

Oh man, people around here are gonna lose their shit. I can't wait. Every time I see a post about not wanting to move to a neighborhood where the schools are "lower than an 8" I want to bang my head against my keyboard.

ETA: Both our neighborhood schools went down a point or two as a direct result of the updated rankings. The scores in the new "Equity" section are much lower than the other scores. Disappointing but not surprising. 

[candreco]

Huh, I would have expected our school's score to go up with the changes, but it didn't. But I also don't see what I know about recent test score stats and other things reflected in their narratives so I dunno.

I do like the change in scoring approach.

[karinothing]

Nov 9, 2017 8:23:46 GMT -5 andwhat said:

So it is going to be a little more realistic and not flat out racist? Of course the rich parents are angry. Where I live has high property value and the local schools are low rated, which is not an accurate reflection of many of the schools.

Right. People are so ridiculous. What is really interesting is now you can see the schools where low income students perform really well, which in Arlington is at Arlington Traditional School, which has low income and not low income students performing at about the same level (both high performing). Hopefully other schools can implement some of the techniques from that school or at least look at why lower income students perform very well there and not at other schools.

It also allowed me to see that our school is failing low income students, which is frustrating because I feel like we have a lot of programs designed to help at risk populations and it is still apparently not working. This is especially interesting in light of heyjude post yesterday about Hispanic kids. The school is dual immersion and focuses on teaching things from a Hispanic world view instead of white one. The Spanish teachers are native speakers and I would really hope that no one would write off any hispanic child merely because of their background at a school like this. We  are still failing Hispanic kids (which account for 54% of the population). Their math, English, and science scores are still 20points below the white students. I think it is really important to look at why that is.

[mskitkat]

I just checked the school we are zoned for elementary. Wow. The new rankings make it very clear just how badly we are failing low income students.

[Deleted]

Interesting. It raised my DD’s school and her eventual HS by 1-2 points each. It lowered the local charter school from a 10 to 6 lol, that school always brags about how great it is, but they can accept or reject any kids they want.

[CallingAllAngels]

Oh, interesting. The elementary school in the popular Stepford neighborhood in my town now has one of the lowest ratings in town. Academically they are a 10, but their equity and low income scores are 4 and 5. Makes me feel much better about not buying in that neighborhood. Good for great schools for adjusting their rankings.

[bex]

okay so if my school has a 9/10 for race/ethnicity, what does that mean exactly? Like for all students its a 9/10, and then also for white students - for test scores (they don't have the data up for income disparity, which I want to see.)

[karinothing]

Nov 9, 2017 8:55:37 GMT -5 bex said:

okay so if my school has a 9/10 for race/ethnicity, what does that mean exactly? Like for all students its a 9/10, and then also for white students - for test scores (they don't have the data up for income disparity, which I want to see.)

If you click on it, it should break it down. It shows how different races/ethnicities perform. My school breaks it down like "all students" "white" and "Hispanic" it doesn't mention lack students, but maybe because the school is 54% Hispanic and 34% white. So the % of black students too small to rate? My school doesn't receive a specific rating for race/ethnicity (which I don't get since it breaks the scores out by race).

[CallingAllAngels]

Nov 9, 2017 8:55:37 GMT -5 bex said:

okay so if my school has a 9/10 for race/ethnicity, what does that mean exactly? Like for all students its a 9/10, and then also for white students - for test scores (they don't have the data up for income disparity, which I want to see.)

I think it means that minority students score similarly to white students on tests. 
ETA: it looks like discipline/attendance is factored in too, which is really interesting.  

[goldengirlz]

I guess I like it in theory, but in practice it seems like most of the “rich” schools went down one point regardless of where they started from. And schools with a large low-income population went down as many as two points.

I suppose this metric is supposed to stand in for the quality of the teachers but I think it just points to how overwhelming a task it is to close the achievement gap.

Rich schools may be able to close the gap if they care about their ratings but poor districts will fall further behind.

I’m glad to hear that at andwhat’s schools improved, and maybe the scores in wealthy black districts are the ones that will benefit most (which is great!) but I still think the overall GreatSchools approach and formula are bullshit.

[laurack]

my daughters elementary school went up, it used to be 5, now it is 7. But looking in the details it is 8 for not low income, but for low income students (30% of the school) only 4/10.

So if we do so poorly by low income students, why did the score go up not down with the new measurement I wonder

[y4m]

I can see how this is a logical change for already high-performing schools who are failing a segment of their population. That should be brought to light.

I wonder how it impacts schools that were low on the GS scale before because of low test scores in a high poverty / high ESL population. It seems like a double penalty for them, potentially, if they get both low test scores and also show large achievement gaps. Hopefully that's not how it works.

[lilac05]

There's a public high school in town that has won best high school in the state several years. Great schools ranks it a 3 with equity and low income as 1/10. It's probably our most economically diverse HS in town, as the old money neighborhood and our poorest neighborhood both feed into it about equally. There's no middle class in that area. Interesting that the results can be so different. Shows how pointless they are!

[AndyCohen]

Nov 9, 2017 8:55:37 GMT -5 bex said:

okay so if my school has a 9/10 for race/ethnicity, what does that mean exactly? Like for all students its a 9/10, and then also for white students - for test scores (they don't have the data up for income disparity, which I want to see.)

My school shows 10/10 for all the races, but 7/10 for low income. Since low income is only 7% of the school, it isn't really reflected in the racial break down. Also because it's a low percentage and the rating is higher than state average it doesn't seem to be affecting the school score of 10/10.

[incogneato]

Bahaha! Suck it, 10-Star schools! As a former teacher in schools that always got 4/10 or 5/10 but the instruction was INCREDIBLE, yet we got looked down on by teachers at 10/10 schools who barely had to teach because 99% of their students were rich, white kids with ponies and private tutors, this is long overdue. And FWIW my kids go to a school with 55% free lunch, 55% esl and yeah, the school never got ranked well on GS but it’s AMAZING. They started a dual-language program that is helping native Spanish speaking students excel AND making English speaking kids fluent in Spanish, thus building bridges of communication throughout our community, family involvement is high across demographics, the teachers are supported and happy, the students love it, my 6 year old is reading and writing above grade level in Spanish (what!?!?) and I hope this change means our school finally gets the props it deserves.

[andwhat]

Nov 9, 2017 9:05:14 GMT -5 y4m said:

I can see how this is a logical change for already high-performing schools who are failing a segment of their population. That should be brought to light.

I wonder how it impacts schools that were low on the GS scale before because of low test scores in a high poverty / high ESL population. It seems like a double penalty for them, potentially, if they get both low test scores and also show large achievement gaps. Hopefully that's not how it works.

For my local school it went from a 3 to a 4. So still not good, but it did go up. What brought the score up was it has a high score for academic progress. From the website:

A promising sign:



Students at this school are making more academic progress from one grade to the next compared to students at other schools in the state.



Above average progress with low test scores means students are starting at a low point but are making larger gains than their peers at other schools in the state.

The average scores are still lower than state average and that is keeping their score down. Also, low income students are not doing well, but that is mostly the entire school since most people I know send their kids to private, myself included. But at least with this new metric, it seems like the score could and should rise over time.

[raangoli]

It didn't really seem to have an impact on the schools we are zoned for, but I did find it interesting that the race/ethnicity was only reported for the HS and not the elementary schools. I didn't look closely enough to understand why this would be.

[incogneato]

Follow up- checked mine and we’re now at a 1/10 but every parent review is a 5 ⭐️

[andwhat]

Nov 9, 2017 9:26:49 GMT -5 incogneato said:

Follow up- checked mine and we’re now at a 1/10 but every parent review is a 5 ⭐️

What was it before?

[y4m]

Nov 9, 2017 9:21:38 GMT -5 andwhat said:

Nov 9, 2017 9:05:14 GMT -5 y4m said:

I can see how this is a logical change for already high-performing schools who are failing a segment of their population. That should be brought to light.

I wonder how it impacts schools that were low on the GS scale before because of low test scores in a high poverty / high ESL population. It seems like a double penalty for them, potentially, if they get both low test scores and also show large achievement gaps. Hopefully that's not how it works.

For my local school it went from a 3 to a 4. So still not good, but it did go up. What brought the score up was it has a high score for academic progress. From the website:

A promising sign:



Students at this school are making more academic progress from one grade to the next compared to students at other schools in the state.



Above average progress with low test scores means students are starting at a low point but are making larger gains than their peers at other schools in the state.

The average scores are still lower than state average and that is keeping their score down. Also, low income students are not doing well, but that is mostly the entire school since most people I know send their kids to private, myself included. But at least with this new metric, it seems like the score could and should rise over time.

My local elementary went up too (from a 1 to a 2).  

That school (which is like 75% low income, 10% white) - got some points for improvement also, as it should.  But 50% of the grade is still test scores, and now 30% of the grade is the gap between the large population of low income students and the small population of high income students.

I wonder what would happen to the grade if the high income students weren't there, or their achievement dropped.  That's not a good goal, but depending on the math, it could potentially lead to a better score.

[CheeringCharm]

I'm glad they're investigating and including this kind of information but still, the idea that you can give such a complex organization as a school a number grade and rank them that way is so absurd to me. There are way too many complexities and nuances that can't be accounted for in a single overall number grade. "This school is a ten" "This school is a four." Sure now they break it down further, which is a step in the right direction, but still. I wish it would just go away entirely (same goes with the annual US New and World Report College rankings).

[karinothing]

The prevailing viewpoint on the schools in our area that show highly performing low income students is because they are lottery based. Meaning the parents had to go through hoops to get their kid into the school and they are all very committed to their kids education.

I don't know if that is all of it, but I am sure it is part of it. And I am not sure how to address that issue at all.

[pugz]

I mean the schools in neighborhoods with only 500k houses are still rated 8/10. Because they have no low income students to serve.

The ratings continue to feel pointless to me. It does shed light on how we aren’t serving all populations well but not sure this will motivate schools to improve. There is no school choice here. You go to your neighborhood school

[isabel]

Is there a way to seek out schools that show high performance for students of all races and income levels despite having a low overall grade? The site doesn’t seem to have filters set up based on that information.

[andwhat]

Nov 9, 2017 9:48:01 GMT -5 isabel said:

Is there a way to seek out schools that show high performance for students of all races and income levels despite having a low overall grade? The site doesn’t seem to have filters set up based on that information.

From the new grading, I don't think I school would meet that criteria, but still have a low overall score. 

The school near me that meets this criteria has an overall of 9.

Equity - 10
All Students - 9
Low-income - 8

[gardengal]

Arlington parents need to take a chill pill.

The parents freaking out over this will still have high home values b/c there's not land to do new subdivisions in Arlington. Also, their precious will grow up to be a mediocre white man no matter the school rating given their primary concern of self-importance. I'm sure they also see no irony (or racism) at all when railing on this & the positions they took at the poll on Tuesday.

[andwhat]

Nov 9, 2017 9:43:13 GMT -5 pugz said:

I mean the schools in neighborhoods with only 500k houses are still rated 8/10. Because they have no low income students to serve.

The ratings continue to feel pointless to me. It does shed light on how we aren’t serving all populations well but not sure this will motivate schools to improve. There is no school choice here. You go to your neighborhood school

All the new homes in my area are 500K+ and there are a lot of them. The local school is still 51% low-income. It depends on how the lines are drawn and who actually chooses to send their kids to the school v. private.

[isabel]

Nov 9, 2017 9:55:19 GMT -5 andwhat said:

Nov 9, 2017 9:48:01 GMT -5 isabel said:

Is there a way to seek out schools that show high performance for students of all races and income levels despite having a low overall grade? The site doesn’t seem to have filters set up based on that information.

From the new grading, I don't think I school would meet that criteria, but still have a low overall score. 

The school near me that meets this criteria has an overall of 9.

Equity - 10
All Students - 9
Low-income - 8

Well, with any score, really. I wanted to see the schools in my area that are serving all students equally regardless of overall score. But it doesn't look like you can filter based on any of that data. I can only filter by school type (public, charter, etc.), elementary vs. high, overall grades, etc.