http://swiftandchangeable.org/index.php?blog=2&disp=comments en-US http://backend.userland.com/rss 60 Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:06:59 +0000 John Thompson [Visitor] c190@http://swiftandchangeable.org/ I have already admitted to being wrong on NCLB, originally supporting it.<br /> <br /> But in the spirit of social science, consider the ways that NCLB has hindered data-driven decision-making.<br /> <br /> The district is held accountable for all students but in our state, individual schools do not have to count the scores of highly mobile populations. (by the way, our term for it is, "we don't have to eat their scores anymore.") Yes, we could produce two sets of reports, one for NCLB and one for decision-making. Maybe you know of districts who were saintly enough to take that approach, but I'm not going to condemn my central office for being human.<br /> <br /> Similarly, we could print NCLB attendance reports and then break the data down and determine how many kids are ACTUALLY attending class versus how many are just not being counted as absent because we are making them do recess/detention after school. <br /> <br /> But who do you think is more likely to go the extra mile and make sure they are distributing accurate data? Its easy to imagine prosperous districts with plenty of capacity who are forcing themselves to face the hard truthes about their poorest minority students. Its tougher to imagine poor districts, with a large percentage of dysfunctional schools, who would incur the extra expense and embarrassment of publishing the more accurate and depressing numbers. <br /> <br />
But in the spirit of social science, consider the ways that NCLB has hindered data-driven decision-making.

The district is held accountable for all students but in our state, individual schools do not have to count the scores of highly mobile populations. (by the way, our term for it is, "we don't have to eat their scores anymore.") Yes, we could produce two sets of reports, one for NCLB and one for decision-making. Maybe you know of districts who were saintly enough to take that approach, but I'm not going to condemn my central office for being human.

Similarly, we could print NCLB attendance reports and then break the data down and determine how many kids are ACTUALLY attending class versus how many are just not being counted as absent because we are making them do recess/detention after school.

But who do you think is more likely to go the extra mile and make sure they are distributing accurate data? Its easy to imagine prosperous districts with plenty of capacity who are forcing themselves to face the hard truthes about their poorest minority students. Its tougher to imagine poor districts, with a large percentage of dysfunctional schools, who would incur the extra expense and embarrassment of publishing the more accurate and depressing numbers.

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