State Testing Scores

State Testing Scores mean jack crap, just in case you didn't know. Many parents decide which schools are the "better" schools by examining state test scores. This is VERY misleading and a grossly inaccurate way to assess the quality of the public school and its teachers. Here's two scenarios:

HIGH PERFORMING SCHOOL
My very first teaching position was in an elementary school on the wealthier side of a big city. Most of the children came from two-parent homes, where the majority of those parents were both college graduates. I had 28 students and all but ONE had computers at home. ALL of the parents came to the parent-teacher conferences, or at least made contact by letter or phone. Every child except two were reading at or above grade level - and the two who weren't: one was from a low-income single parent home from the very small pocket of "lower-end" apartment homes on the edge of our school zoning; the other was a hispanic boy whose parents didn't speak any English and he had lived in the U.S. for maybe a year. I had parents visiting daily, volunteering for EVERYTHING, and not only everpresent in their children's lives, but in mine as well!
The teachers in this school weren't spectacular. I don't think they were necessarily horrible, but I didn't see any fabulous teaching going on. For the most part, we taught straight from the text book - absolutely nothing creative or innovative about that. ALL students who took the state test passed. I mean they should have, that school has a 99% pass rate (I'm surprised it's not 100%).

LOW PERFORMING SCHOOL
My second school (and my current school) is once again in the "inner-city" of our county. It a very low-income population where the majority of families are on welfare. I would say about 3 students in my classroom have computers at home. The majority of the students come from single parent homes, multi-family homes, or both. Most parents did not finish high school, much less go to college. Many residences in our area are rental homes (average $400/mo) or government housing. It is also a very high-transient area because families move from place to place due to jobs, eviction, etc. Therefore, out of 20 students in a class, an average of 5 students will leave and 5 new students will come in throughout the course of the school year. In our K-5 school, only 50% of our students have been there since Kindergarten, maybe even less. Many students have been to a different school every year, some have moved to three or four during one school year. I might have 5 or 6 parents show up to parent-teacher conferences, maybe more if I harrass them. At least half of my class will be below grade level in reading, one fourth of them will be at least two grade levels below. Many students do not have basic Math skills and some still count on their fingers by the time they get to 5th grade. Most of the parents do not make their children complete their homework, and if they bring home failing grades on their tests, the children are not given any consequences or reprimands at home. There were rarely phone calls to me or notes requesting conferences.
Now the teachers in our school are pretty miraculous - not all of them, but the majority of the staff in this school are very intelligent, creative, hard-working, & dedicated teachers. You won't walk into many of the classrooms and see students working out of textbooks or on worksheets. They are working in centers and in small groups, they are participating in hands-on activities and using technology (side note: even with massive budget cuts last year, we still managed to each get a fabulous SmartBoard in our classrooms. Apparantly, that stimulus money sent down to our state was earmarked for technology. Thanks Obama!) There's all sorts of creative things happening in the classroom. I had TWO students out of 21 pass the state test, six students after retesting. We have about a 33% passing rate in our school. We are currently in our third year of School Improvement - if we don't make fantastic improvements this coming year, the state will come in and intervene...and that could mean anything :(

So, do you see? Obviously there is a direct correlation between parenting/homelife and school performance. But from the outside looking in, our society is ready to judge the school and the staff when students are not passing these state tests.

I would say the ONLY reason I would not want my own child to attend my school is for this reason: unfortunately, there is also a direct correclation between parenting/homelife and behavior. Many of my students come in using words I didn't even know existed until I was in high school. One of our third graders was suspended three times for sexual harrassment (touching girls inapproprately in private places). Our children do not get much discipline at home, if any. On top of working to get our children on grade level (yes, even those two grade levels below in reading and not able to add or subtract), we are also their primary disciplinarians...yay. I wouldn't want my own child exposed to the behaviors I have seen and dealt with.

So the next time you hear someone compare the quality of the school and its teachers because of test scores, you know what to tell them.