The better alternative to Great Schools.

[Anonymous]

I was digging up school scores for virginia (because GS is an epic fail) and found this:

http://schoolquality.virginia.gov/advanced-search

What interests me is that is shows the number/% of the class that is above the grade level.

Way better than GS.

[Anonymous]

What do you put into your search?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What do you put into your search?

DP. What do you mean? Look up the various schools you're interested in and then compare their profiles.

[Anonymous]

These are the actual SOL score reports from the state. Much better than Great Schools, which takes the same info, does some sort of weighting of the data and then comes up with their scores.

You can filter results by gender, race, economically disadvantaged, disabled, English learners. I do wish it gave the inverse for some of those groups, e.g. you can look at economically disadvantaged but not those who are not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These are the actual SOL score reports from the state. Much better than Great Schools, which takes the same info, does some sort of weighting of the data and then comes up with their scores.

You can filter results by gender, race, economically disadvantaged, disabled, English learners. I do wish it gave the inverse for some of those groups, e.g. you can look at economically disadvantaged but not those who are not.

They don't give you the reverse statistics, but all of the data you need to calculate them is there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What do you put into your search?

DP. What do you mean? Look up the various schools you're interested in and then compare their profiles.

How is that different than school profiles? Is there an overall chart where you can easily compare them all together?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These are the actual SOL score reports from the state. Much better than Great Schools, which takes the same info, does some sort of weighting of the data and then comes up with their scores.

You can filter results by gender, race, economically disadvantaged, disabled, English learners. I do wish it gave the inverse for some of those groups, e.g. you can look at economically disadvantaged but not those who are not.

They don't give you the reverse statistics, but all of the data you need to calculate them is there.

But then I have to do more work You can also just look at the "White" group since they are much less likely to be economically disadvantaged in Arlington.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What do you put into your search?

DP. What do you mean? Look up the various schools you're interested in and then compare their profiles.

How is that different than school profiles? Is there an overall chart where you can easily compare them all together?

You mean how is this site different from what you can get on Great Schools? This data is more current and doesn't have the Great Schools editorial component.

As far as I know the Virginia site doesn't provide comparison tables, but it's easy enough to do that on your own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What do you put into your search?

DP. What do you mean? Look up the various schools you're interested in and then compare their profiles.

How is that different than school profiles? Is there an overall chart where you can easily compare them all together?

It's different because you can see the data before great schools uses it's biased agenda to eff with the numbers and produce a completely ridiculous score.

There is no easy comparison at this time. But here's the deal: there are amazing schools are great schools "5", that fail 20% of their class but have another 40% pass at an advanced level. This is important because typical score evaluations from GS are just how many passed. (That 80% number is really how many in percentage passed but does not indicate advanced scores.) What is more important is seeing how many excel. If no one is excelling, then we have a problem. But if we are having more kids excelling over failing, then that school doesn't deserve a mediocre score, regardless of SES or race.

[Anonymous]

SchoolDigger gives all the race and FARMS data.

[Anonymous]

Great website. It shows that while the hispanic population is dragging down test scores at our school, other kids are excelling and equally to the same cohort at other schools. This is how data should be analyzed.

[Anonymous]

I see this is very troubling to schools like YORKTOWN that have taken huge hits.
They went from a 9 to a 5.
I think the current rankings more accurately reflect the quality of that particular school.
Great school is the standard when evaluating real estate..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I see this is very troubling to schools like YORKTOWN that have taken huge hits.
They went from a 9 to a 5.
I think the current rankings more accurately reflect the quality of that particular school.
Great school is the standard when evaluating real estate..

You're silly.

You don't think people actually weigh GS ratings when shopping for a house, do you? They do not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I see this is very troubling to schools like YORKTOWN that have taken huge hits.
They went from a 9 to a 5.
I think the current rankings more accurately reflect the quality of that particular school.
Great school is the standard when evaluating real estate..

You're silly.

You don't think people actually weigh GS ratings when shopping for a house, do you? They do not.

Of course many people do. They shouldn't, but they do because it's easier than actually taking the time to look at the underlying data and many people are statistics-illiterate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I see this is very troubling to schools like YORKTOWN that have taken huge hits.
They went from a 9 to a 5.
I think the current rankings more accurately reflect the quality of that particular school.
Great school is the standard when evaluating real estate..

You're silly.

You don't think people actually weigh GS ratings when shopping for a house, do you? They do not.

They definitely do! We wouldn't buy a house with a GS rating lower than 6. Even my friends without children buy based on Great Schools. When a school gets to a 4 or so, it snowballs and everything goes downhill in the neighborhood. Those who have the means get out and those that are left just keep bringing down the school.

People also use GS as a race meter since GS tracks race and poverty so well (to the detriment of everyone).