Michael Atherton writes: > Nice and > student achievement don't always correlate, neither do management > style and organizational success. Mr. Goldman's disconnect with > the overall performance for students at Jefferson illustrates why > testing is so critical for educational reform, without it we could > go on for years believing that everything is just fine and dandy.
Mr. Goldman wrote nothing about nice, or "everything" being "fine and dandy." He wrote >As a parent of public school > children, I haven't seen a lot of evidence of public school employees > being obstacles to my children's education. My experience is pretty > limited to Jefferson Community school, but I have been very, very > impressed with the teachers, principal, vice principal, and even the > much-maligned office staff. I think Mr. Goldman is being criticized for a statement he didn't make. He limited his evaluation to his own kids. It would be wonderful to have No Child Left Behind - but heck, even the feds are giving schools until 2014 for a 100 percent passing standard! As Michael writes: >Test scores aren't everything... Mr. Goldman's opinion about his own experience, and Michael's opinion about the (limited) indication that test scores reveal can both be true. Michael's opposition to Mr. Goldman implies that "the teachers, principal, vice principal, and even the much-maligned office staff" are to blame for low performance. Perhaps. But there are other, deeper questions about Jefferson - what is the educational level of kids coming in; do students progress at least a year for every year they are in the school (the district charts this through NALT tests) - in other words, what's the starting position, not just the scores? The state report cards are very poor on this count. It is worth noting that 44 percent of Jefferson's students are limited English proficient and 12 percent are in special ed. To be fair to Michael and his genuine concern, Jefferson's Hispanic, black, limited-English speakers and kids in poverty did not make Adequate Yearly Progress by state/federal standards, but white kids did. (Again, the feds measure groups of students, not how much individual kids learn - so the results can be skewed by recent arrivals to the district and a class of kids who start out with less ability than the kids in that group the year before.) Overall, Michael's genuine concern about Jefferson is important to the overall topic - but not in opposition to what Mr. Goldman wrote, IMHO. David Brauer Kingfield REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
