Tonight at 6 p.m. at Rosebank Elementary, the four candidates for the District 5 school board seat will participate in a forum. Before the forum, I thought it would be useful to take a look at all of the schools in District 5. (Special schools like Johnson, Cora Howe, and Murrell are excluded because of a lack of data.) All of the data is available on the TVAAS public data website.
The candidates are John Haubenreich, Elissa Kim, Erica Lanier, and Gracie Porter (incumbent). District 7 Councilman Anthony Davis will moderate.
All of these scores reflect 3-year averages of composite scores of the most relevant tests (TCAP for elementary and middle schools and the ACT for high schools). I chose to focus on growth scores because I think that is the best way to judge an individual school (and eliminate the excuse of "these kids came to me not knowing how to read/add & subtract/write/etc.")
The one place where I included something other than growth scores was the ACT Mean Student Score for the high school because it offers an absolute judgment as the whether students are college ready. The minimum ACT score for most colleges is 19. What is more meaningful is the ACT composite score considered the standard for "college-readiness": 21. (The average of the four major subscores is 21.) East Lit, Nashville School of the Arts, Pearl-Cohn, and Stratford all fall short of this. While those schools don't deserve all of the blame for those scores falling short, the fact is that every non-academic magnet in District 5 is producing an average student that will most likely flunk out of college, if he or she even get there in the first place. The average student at Pearl-Cohn and Stratford doesn't come close to making the minimum ACT score to attend their local public university, Tennessee State.
Bottom line: Most of the students in District 5 attend schools that negatively impact their academic growth. Those who graduate aren't likely to qualify to attend a 4-year college or university. Those who are able to attend aren't predicted to graduate.
This is where we are, folks. If this isn't a crisis, I'm not sure what is.
(Disclosures: I'm supporting Elissa Kim in this election. Separately, I teach at LEAD Academy High School, which is a part of a network that includes Cameron College Prep. My wife teaches at KIPP, though she didn't teach there during the years reflected in this data. None of this affects any of the data presented above, but I like being upfront about these sorts of things. )
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11:14 a.m. update: Some typos fixed.
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| Key for Elementary & Middle Schools |
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| District 5 Elementary Schools |
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| District 5 Middle Schools |
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| District 5 High Schools |
All of these scores reflect 3-year averages of composite scores of the most relevant tests (TCAP for elementary and middle schools and the ACT for high schools). I chose to focus on growth scores because I think that is the best way to judge an individual school (and eliminate the excuse of "these kids came to me not knowing how to read/add & subtract/write/etc.")
The one place where I included something other than growth scores was the ACT Mean Student Score for the high school because it offers an absolute judgment as the whether students are college ready. The minimum ACT score for most colleges is 19. What is more meaningful is the ACT composite score considered the standard for "college-readiness": 21. (The average of the four major subscores is 21.) East Lit, Nashville School of the Arts, Pearl-Cohn, and Stratford all fall short of this. While those schools don't deserve all of the blame for those scores falling short, the fact is that every non-academic magnet in District 5 is producing an average student that will most likely flunk out of college, if he or she even get there in the first place. The average student at Pearl-Cohn and Stratford doesn't come close to making the minimum ACT score to attend their local public university, Tennessee State.
Bottom line: Most of the students in District 5 attend schools that negatively impact their academic growth. Those who graduate aren't likely to qualify to attend a 4-year college or university. Those who are able to attend aren't predicted to graduate.
This is where we are, folks. If this isn't a crisis, I'm not sure what is.
(Disclosures: I'm supporting Elissa Kim in this election. Separately, I teach at LEAD Academy High School, which is a part of a network that includes Cameron College Prep. My wife teaches at KIPP, though she didn't teach there during the years reflected in this data. None of this affects any of the data presented above, but I like being upfront about these sorts of things. )
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11:14 a.m. update: Some typos fixed.
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