Great Schools new “grades”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Tjs new ranking is an 8/10. What a joke.

TJ is above average but not outstanding. So 8/10 seems about right.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would be very skeptical to buy a home with school ratings less than 6.

When we bought less than 10 years ago, every school in our pyramid was a 9 or 10. Now they're a 4 through 7. So good luck with that.

Our new country is going to be great!

[Anonymous]

Why can't they just compare school to school on race achievement, income and achievement, AP/IB participation, and AP/IB and graduation achievement?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tjs new ranking is an 8/10. What a joke.

TJ is above average but not outstanding. So 8/10 seems about right.

It is not right. To put in perspective how ridiculous that is, West Springfield is also supposedly 8/10 despite WSHS SATs being 360(!) points lower than TJ and their AP participation is 57% versus 100% at TJ. Just demonstrating that GS is meaningless.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Skills-based grading for school ratings?Artificially bringing down the top and bringing up the bottom.

That’s pretty much it. Everything is going to end up as like a 6-8/10.

That's actually pretty awesome. Greatschools has been directly responsible for the increased stratification/segregation of schools, neighborhoods, and cities. Making every school scored similarly will help reduce that.

The joke is on people who believe it. FCPS schools are pretty much the same. The difference is with the staff.....not the zip code.

What are you basing that assertion on? I taught in two FCPS buildings. One was in a very wealthy district. The other school was in a title 1 district. The low-average kids got more in the wealthy school. In the resources in the poor district were sopped up by all the extra students with significant needs. There were fantastic teachers in both schools. From my experience, your child’s education will be shaped by their peers.

Again, what are you basing that assertion on, PP?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tjs new ranking is an 8/10. What a joke.

TJ is above average but not outstanding. So 8/10 seems about right.

Um, yeah.


Does DCUM have a way to nominate PP’s post as “dumbest comment of the year?”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tjs new ranking is an 8/10. What a joke.

TJ is above average but not outstanding. So 8/10 seems about right.

Um, yeah.


Does DCUM have a way to nominate PP’s post as “dumbest comment of the year?”

Someone hit a nerve lol.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why can't they just compare school to school on race achievement, income and achievement, AP/IB participation, and AP/IB and graduation achievement?

That would be useful

[Anonymous]

People are going to start ignoring the ratings now that they suck. It will not make a more egalitarian school system. Parents will use FARMs rates and other proxies to pick the better performing schools instead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Skills-based grading for school ratings?Artificially bringing down the top and bringing up the bottom.

That’s pretty much it. Everything is going to end up as like a 6-8/10.

That's actually pretty awesome. Greatschools has been directly responsible for the increased stratification/segregation of schools, neighborhoods, and cities. Making every school scored similarly will help reduce that.

The joke is on people who believe it. FCPS schools are pretty much the same. The difference is with the staff.....not the zip code.

What are you basing that assertion on? I taught in two FCPS buildings. One was in a very wealthy district. The other school was in a title 1 district. The low-average kids got more in the wealthy school. In the resources in the poor district were sopped up by all the extra students with significant needs. There were fantastic teachers in both schools. From my experience, your child’s education will be shaped by their peers.

Again, what are you basing that assertion on, PP?

If there were fantastic teachers in both school why would a zip code change the education they got....because one had more expensive binders. Every FCPS school offers the same curriculum, music programs, art classes, electives, sports/activities. I too have taught in both types of schools-my point is this FCPS is FCPS I've seen parents with money in both schools and I've seen good and bad teachers and students in both. I'm not sure really what you are going on about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People are going to start ignoring the ratings now that they suck. It will not make a more egalitarian school system. Parents will use FARMs rates and other proxies to pick the better performing schools instead.

+1 GS has definitely closed the achievement gap on paper by penalizing the highest performing schools and pumping up the low ones, now everyone is between a 4-8 on paper and yay isn’t that great. lol.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Skills-based grading for school ratings?Artificially bringing down the top and bringing up the bottom.

That’s pretty much it. Everything is going to end up as like a 6-8/10.

That's actually pretty awesome. Greatschools has been directly responsible for the increased stratification/segregation of schools, neighborhoods, and cities. Making every school scored similarly will help reduce that.

The joke is on people who believe it. FCPS schools are pretty much the same. The difference is with the staff.....not the zip code.

What are you basing that assertion on? I taught in two FCPS buildings. One was in a very wealthy district. The other school was in a title 1 district. The low-average kids got more in the wealthy school. In the resources in the poor district were sopped up by all the extra students with significant needs. There were fantastic teachers in both schools. From my experience, your child’s education will be shaped by their peers.

Again, what are you basing that assertion on, PP?

If there were fantastic teachers in both school why would a zip code change the education they got....because one had more expensive binders. Every FCPS school offers the same curriculum, music programs, art classes, electives, sports/activities. I too have taught in both types of schools-my point is this FCPS is FCPS I've seen parents with money in both schools and I've seen good and bad teachers and students in both. I'm not sure really what you are going on about.

DP, I have also taught at wealthy and title one school and I can tell you 1000%. The teachers at the wealthy schools are a bit better, the teacher turnaround is lower, and the parents expectations are higher.

Also, the kids are Generally smarter and the parents are more involved. And the title one school the parents often had good intentions, but they didn’t know how to help their kids and quite often the majority of the students were one to two grade levels behind. There is going to be a gap between a wealthier and title one school, even with all the same resources and curriculum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why can't they just compare school to school on race achievement, income and achievement, AP/IB participation, and AP/IB and graduation achievement?

That would be useful

They can. They have all the data. So why don't they? 50% achievement, 25% growth, 25% participation. Sounds reasonable to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People are going to start ignoring the ratings now that they suck. It will not make a more egalitarian school system. Parents will use FARMs rates and other proxies to pick the better performing schools instead.

+1 GS has definitely closed the achievement gap on paper by penalizing the highest performing schools and pumping up the low ones, now everyone is between a 4-8 on paper and yay isn’t that great. lol.

“Great Schools” ratings are effectively meaningless now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People are going to start ignoring the ratings now that they suck. It will not make a more egalitarian school system. Parents will use FARMs rates and other proxies to pick the better performing schools instead.

+1 GS has definitely closed the achievement gap on paper by penalizing the highest performing schools and pumping up the low ones, now everyone is between a 4-8 on paper and yay isn’t that great. lol.

“Great Schools” ratings are effectively meaningless now.

They've been useless for at least 7 years now; in or around 2017 they starting docking points from schools for "not having enough diversity."

Because yes, of course, that's what prospective new homebuyers are concerned with when it comes to a new school---not having enough diversity.