SlitheyTove

D1 brought home a letter announcing that her school is failing under NCLB. It's not the only school in that position, of course. I AM wondering if it is the only failing school also on Newsweek's list of "America's Top Public High Schools". Maybe I should write something in the comments section of the Newsweek list about how the list's methodology should watch out for things like this?

While I was looking up D1's school's precise position on the Newsweek list, I took a look at the school's historical performance on the list. The school's Newsweek index--that ratio of AP tests taken divided by graduating high school seniors--varied slightly over the years, but the school's position on the overall list has dropped significantly. Intrigued, I took a look at the top 100 schools for 2005 and 2009. In 2005, the #1 school index was 10.8, and the #100 school index was 2.8. In 2009, the #1 and #100 schools had indices of 16.1 and 3.8, respectively. Talk about an AP arms race! Is the uptick in AP tests being driven by college admissions? Or is it because high schools want to move up the Newsweek list? Or both?

This just seems utterly insane.

missypie

Texas ranks schools based on how the students do on state tests - from "Exemplary" to "Academically Unacceptable." The rankings depend on the percentage of kids in each category who pass the tests...Caucasian, Minority, Handicapped, Economically Disadvantaged. If you had only two "economically disadvantaged" students in the whole school and one failed the tests, you'd have a 50% pass rate in that category and would be considered "Academically Unacceptable", even if other 99.8% of the student body passed the tests.

Anyway, because of the way they do the rankings, we've had schools in the Newsweek Top 100 that the state deemed Academically Unacceptable.

cartera45

The Newsweek ranking is a joke IMO.

zoeydoggie

Our local school district is playing the game. They intend to make all of the high schools in the district make the Newsweek rankings. They have eliminated some Honors level classes and offer only AP or regular level. They are also paying the fee for the AP tests for everyone who takes them.

The state standards have been watered down enough that almost every school has reached the proficient standard.

cartera45

Is there some financial relationship between College Board and Newsweek?

Lergnom

Let's put high school rankings in perspective. Any thinking person knows the college ranking are bull but the universe of colleges is pretty darn small. The number of high schools is immense. I doubt that anyone can describe how switching lousy metrics to a larger population could generate better statistical ranking results.

worried_mom

cartera45, I'm not aware of any direct connection between College Board and Newsweek, BUT.....

Newsweek is owned by the Washington Post Co. -- which also owns Kaplan -- which just happens to offer test prep classes for AP tests.

Coincidence?

mimk6

Nope, your school is not the only one. Our school and a number of other "failing schools" in the area also make Newsweek. The reason is that they are schools that host excellent magnet programs where kids take tons of APs and do well -- but the non-magnet portion of the school is failing. The Newsweek ranking is a huge joke -- it's just a numbers game and it's not even a reflection of how well the kids do on the test, if I recall correctly.

Treetopleaf

NCLB was designed to insure that in time all schools will fail. Then they can bust the unions and force funding for private schools aka 'school choice'.

I say this because to avoid a 'fail' they expect 100 pass rates in every category, e.g. special ed kids (how could 100% of severely disabled pass?), ESL students (can't pass if you just got here this year but must take the test), low income students (pass the English test even though no one ever read a book to you in early childhood), etc.

mathmom

You can also be a failing school for dumb reasons. One year our middle school made the list because one too many Hispanic students failed to show up on test day. If they had showed up and failed the tests school wouldn't have made the list.

That said, I think the Newsweek list is particularly stupid. The number one school on the list for Westchester is a school in Yonkers that has an IB program. It's a great school for the 18% who get IB diplomas, for the rest, I don't know...

gloworm

Treetopleaf,

I totally agree w/you.

missypie,

In the state where I teach (but do not live), no subgroup can be included in any results unless there are at least 40 in that subgroup. For the last several years our highest achieving subgroup hasn't reached 40.

In reality I think it's not NCLB, but MCTEBLB. More children than ever being left behind.

emeraldkity4

I AM wondering if it is the only failing school also on Newsweek's list of "America's Top Public High Schools"

Far from it.

AL34

Nope - DS's school is on the list and is failing due to lack of improvement in the special needs category. Jacked up system that is.

midmo

Senator Ted Kennedy was a primary sponsor of the NCLB legislation. As I recall, he was hardly an opponent of teachers' unions. He also was never in any way a supporter of school choice legislation.

On the topic: there was never a stupider ranking than the Newsweek high school ranking.

mommusic

I love how our HS never quite makes the top hundred, but a couple of area schools do, and are quite noisy about it. But our HS had the most NMFS's in the STATE, of any HS, public or private, so we must be doing something right.

We are also noted for our special ed program--people move into the district for it, which undoubtedly doesn't help the "rankings."

S'ok, we're doing good work.