1000 Schools

Recently (last week) the State Board of Education in Sacramento decided to identify the top 1000 schools that needed "fixing."  On the face of it there is some appropriateness to that task.  However, the "devil" resides in the details.  AND we can once again thank RTTT (Race to the Top) for rushed legislation that certainly lacks clarity.

There are many questions raised about this issue and some press comment on the inequities and somewhat insane process of identification of these schools.  Probably the best representation that I have found was published in the SF Chronicle.   Arguably many of us can improve but this makes little sense.

As an example, there is a 10% cap on the number of schools that can be identified in any district (e.g., LAUSD).  The demographics spell out that while there still plenty on the list, there are 6 schools that exceed 800 on their API?  The fact is that there are good schools that are doing good work that are on the list (that is not to say that there aren't others that are appropriately placed on the same list).  Another interesting exclusion from the list (if we must have one), are all charters (while I understand the membership there is voluntary, it is interesting that they cannot be designated as "bad").

So when it is all done what happens to these "bad" schools?  The parents are notified and allowed to transfer to another school (which we do already).  That's it!  An inaccurate system, some public embarrassment (maybe), and the option to transfer.

As to our plight, we like many schools and districts in Riverside County (and the rest of the state) are on the list.  We have 3 of our specialized alternative programs that serve special populations identified (i.e., Summit View, Opportunity, and Lincoln HS).  Additionally, we have two elementary schools identified (i.e., Liberty and Fremont) with API scores of 713 and 722 respectively (both of which have a similar school rank in the 3rd decile).