Comment: School rankings make clear
recessionary stresses are here, too

When I read the statistics, I could hardly believe it. How could the Grosse Pointe Public School System have two high schools with identical curriculum, course offerings, hiring and teaching practices and yet have one perform so differently than the other?

How could the students at Grosse Pointe North outperform their peers at Grosse Pointe South by 15% in math proficiency and by an amazing 84% in reading proficiency?

No, that’s not a typo.

What’s that? You say you read a report that seems to show the exact opposite? We’ll get to that. But let’s start with what has transpired in public education whereby standardized test results are as newsworthy as they’ve become.

Public schools today are at the eye of a hurricane brought about by a confluence of some historically significant influences. This is not a new pattern in our history. Schools have been called upon to assimilate immigrants, lead the way on racial desegregation,and push properly prepared students into international competition with world economies.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, scarred by the energy crisis, the Iran hostage event, combined with a perceived downward trend in SAT scores, a blue-ribbon committee published a report titled “A Nation at Risk” that contained apocryphal language warning that our national educational deficiencies were a threat to national security. The message reached fertile ground in those Cold War times.

“A Nation at Risk” was published in 1983. Few documents have had as great an impact on public education. Consider the Grosse Pointe Public School System’s tag line: “Excellence in Education.” I doubt it’s a coincidence that the Reagan panel’s title was the National Commission on Excellence in Education. This report launched the “accountability and testing era” for public schools.

Before this, standardized tests had never been the primary emphasis of American public schools – and the trend has continued in the form of George W. Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” and then again with Barack Obama’s “Race to the Top.” Testing is the very foundation of these laws.

They have been codified to such an extent that performance on standardized tests can drive not only funding decisions, but dictate who can be hired, and whether a neighborhood school can even remain open. Strip off the party labels and they are nearly identical. Amazingly, at the peak of partisan acrimony, reliance on standardized tests has enjoyed almost unflinching bipartisan support.

Meanwhile the American public has, by and large, accepted as gospel that better test scores mean better schools. Drops in scores, or stagnancy, is rarely balanced against the concurrent American desire to educate every student and therefore test every student. Following our core democratic principles, this is a uniquely American phenomenon.

Is such narrow emphasis on math and reading consistent with other American core values? Many would consider “American ingenuity” a key contributor to our rise as an economic power. Standardized tests do little to measure this and many other character traits that we value as citizens and families. As a practical matter, standardized tests de-emphasize these as well as performing, practical and liberal arts.

The bottom line of the accountability era is, well, the bottom line. The sentiment seems to be, boil the output of the public schools down to a single number. Stack all those numbers against each other and reward those at the top and penalize those at the bottom. Not only is this the path we are on, we are well down it as well.

As the names would imply, No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top would seem to have the best interests of our nation’s children in mind. Some would charge the effort has been co-opted or even borne out of political interests – that public schools were sent on a fool’s errand to prove they could not deliver thereby paving the way for charter school and voucher expansion. But one thing is undisputable. Never has a country made standardized testing such a high stakes game without knowing if the strategy will pay dividends – not knowing if the unintended consequences will actually hurt our children.

Are we really measuring student progress?

The measurement of a school’s standardized test score trend is ostensibly a measure of its progress. Philosophically this is a logical goal. When put into practice, however, the state is not really measuring individual student progress at all.

Test scores have their place, but like any individual data point they have limitations and need context. I believe history will view the current era launched by “A Nation at Risk” as incredibly over-leveraged on standardized test scores. We need to find the balance across all the data points and indicators available to us. Standardized tests are just one.

Let’s get back to my astonishment for how Grosse Pointe North can so significantly outperform Grosse Pointe South. In any scientific analysis variables are a consideration. If we are going to place so much emphasis on standardized test scores and their year-over-year trend, then key variables should be factored.

One that has been consistently recorded and generally accepted as a significant indicator of student performance on standardized tests is whether a student is Economically Disadvantaged (ED) or Non-Economically Disadvantaged (NED). ED students have long been accounted for in terms of those who qualify for federal Free or Reduced Lunches. True to pattern, since federal funds are involved, reporting on standardized tests for these students is required. Below is the comparison of North’s ED student population versus South’s ED student population on standardized tests. At long last, here is North’s advantage:

Economically Disadvantaged Student Proficiency on 2008 Standardized Test in Reading and Math

Plainly stated among Economically Disadvantaged students, those who qualify for free and reduced lunches, North has outperformed South in terms of the percentage of those students who are judged by the state to be proficient in Reading and Math. How many ED students attend each school? That’s coming.

So North must be the better school, right? No? Isn’t that the conclusion others have reached from other reports? I wouldn’t conclude, based on the data above, that North is better than South any more than I would look at South’s higher ranking in the state’s recent “Top to Bottom” report and conclude it was the better school than North.

I propose a new bottom line maxim in the Bottom Line Era. Overly narrow interpretations of standardized test results must be avoided and balanced with other means of evaluating the output of our programs.

The Achievement Gap settles in

Disregard for the moment North’s performance advantage and consider the absolute nature of the results. Grosse Pointe’s economically disadvantaged students are performing at a markedly lower level than their NED counterparts. Is Grosse Pointe unique in this regard? Sadly, absolutely not. And to be fair, one of the stated objectives of NCLB was to shine a light on this issue. Clearly it has.

ED student performance relative to NED performance is colloquially called the Achievement Gap. It is one of the most studied and reported issues in the history of public education in the United States borne out of our democratic principles that seek a free an equal education for all America’s children. Shouldn’t we expect that the ranks of the economically disadvantaged have been growing as a result of the "Great Recession"? Particularly here in the state of Michigan? The statistics make clear that the ED population is growing nationally and at the state level.

In 2001 in the United States, 37% of students were classified as ED. In the same year Michigan’s ED student population was 29.6%. The most recent national statistics for 2008 showed the national ED student population had grown to 42.9%.  By Michigan Department of Education figures for 2009-10 Michigan has climbed to an astonishing 45%, reflecting a 50% increase in Free and Reduced Lunch enrollment from 2001.

Has Grosse Pointe been immune from this state and national trend? Consider this data from each building in the Grosse Pointe Public School System showing the change of composition of our ED population pre-dating the "Great Recession" (from 1995) and then in the midst of it (from 2006 to 2009):

Economically Disadvantaged Report

As a district, a full 10.5% of our student population qualifies for free and reduced lunches, the proxy for Economically Disadvantaged classification. In aggregate, our composite percentage is obviously well below the state and national averages.

But aggregate numbers don’t tell the full story and, taking a page from the state’s Top to Bottom rating methodology, trend should be an equal consideration. But consider also the disparity in the ED population among North and South and their respective feeder schools. Two-thirds of the ED population feeds into North and one-third into South.

Relative to recently reported test scores, look at what has happened to this population in just the last three years. Poupard, already with the highest concentration of ED students in the district in 2006, has seen that population nearly double again in the last three years. Little Poupard Elementary now has more ED students than all of Grosse Pointe South, which is five times larger in terms of student enrollment. Nearly half of Poupard students are economically disadvantaged. Allow that to sink in.

Fifteen years ago North and South had just 2% and 1% ED population respectively. Those proportions have held steady – while both have been multiplied by a factor of 7. In the last three years, corresponding with recent state “Top to Bottom” reports measuring yearly progress over this period of time, North’s ED population has almost doubled.

Considering that the state reported numbers are of a binary nature (proficient or non-proficient) and that higher scores cannot mask lower scores, if North has twice the number of ED students as South, with a proficiency ratio of 38% and 45% in math and reading, the end result is obvious. Despite, thankfully, North demonstrating greater ability to help ED students become proficient, the volume of students is a clear contributor of the proficiency measure disparity.

What might North’s and Poupard’s scores and ranking look like if they had the same proportion of ED students as South and Kerby? Or if Kerby had the same as Poupard? Or if North were only as successful as South in helping the ED population of students to demonstrate proficiency? Legitimate questions all.

The "Great Recession" reached Grosse Pointe

As a community, we need to come to grips with the fact that our economically disadvantaged population has grown significantly in the last three years and is now 10 times greater than our 1995 levels. Sadly so are many other communities across the state and the country.

If we are going to place the same emphasis on standardized tests as the federal government and Lansing – a question that we must contemplate very seriously – our ED population growth simply has to be part of our analysis and ultimately our response strategy. In comparison to other high schools with whom it is are most commonly compared (including South), North’s proportion of ED students is notably higher. Ignoring this reality would be folly.

Struggles with serving this population of students needs to become a greater part of the public consciousness of our community as it has been nationally. The fact is, it has long been a part of most Michigan communities’ consciousness. It just so happens now that we even have one school that even moderately reflects the economic diversity of the state.

Detroit Public Schools have been the poster child for school reform, and certainly they have not done themselves any favors, but to add to their growing misery index, DPS’ student population comprises a staggering 79% of economically disadvantaged students. Harper Woods' schools, with whom we share a border, stands at 66% – more than six times the proportion among our schools. As regional citizens we need to reflect upon that.

North’s achievements over the last three years, in light of all this data, should give us more reason to be proud of what Principal Tim Bearden and his staff have been able to achieve rather than to accuse them. Consider the vaunted Newsweek rankings and how it indexes on proportion of Advanced Placement tests taken per pupil.

I reviewed the Newsweek data from the last five years. Michigan has nearly 800 public high schools. Newsweek ranks those by their AP/IB tests taken index. Over the last five years in Michigan only 11 schools have been in the state’s top 20. Two of those are magnet/charter schools that pre-select their students. I discount them significantly since, to me, that’s not a true public school.

Two of the remaining nine are Grosse Pointe North and Grosse Pointe South. Clearly both of our high schools have created a culture of high achievement that encourages students to stretch their academic comfort zone. And the statistics show North’s students have to make a greater stretch. Good for North, I say. This is a strength that we can uniquely leverage.

In the Accountability Era we must keep our perspective. We can’t rationalize low performance and this is not a plea for us to do so. But neither should we over-index on any one data point either – both good and bad. High standardized test scores should not lull us into complacency not delude us into thinking we can’t improve. The rising ED population is not a resignation to improvement. The point here is that is must be factored in our strategy and programs.

The bigger question is how do we wish to judge the output of our program. Will we do so as Washington D.C. and Lansing wish us to with such massive indexing on standardized test scores? Or do we take the opportunity now to make our own decisions. Do we not stand better position to judge what is best for the Grosse Pointe Public School System? I believe we are, we can, we must, and we will.

In the final analysis we must recognize the Economically Disadvantaged Achievement gap issue as a universal one. This is not a “Poupard Issue” or a “North Issue” and is most certainly not a “North versus South Issue” despite the inclination of some to frame it as such. This is not a constructive means of focusing on the challenge.

Finally, this is not a race issue. Clinically and educationally Grosse Pointe is dealing with a purely economic issue and we should, and must, speak freely and openly about it in those terms if we want to make progress on it.

Every single one of our schools has economically disadvantaged students, not just North and Poupard. Every single one of our schools has seen this population grow exponentially since 1995. We need to share best practicies and successes across the district to help all of these students reach their potential.

In this context, this challenge is our greatest opportunity to distinguish ourselves further as a world class district. Under certain circumstances, many districts should almost be expected to deliver outstanding results, by any variety of measures. But what of those required to deal with a more significant challenge? Are we collectively up to that task? We have proven that we already are.

I look at what we were able to accomplish financially over the last couple of years. I believe we solved some economic problems in a way that will prove to be the standard other districts will follow. We can now leverage that newfound strength to address our next greatest challenge, finding a way to truly serve the needs of each and every student – particularly as those students and their needs change every year.

If any district has the means, wherewithal, and motivation to enable students to reach their full potential it is the Grosse Pointe Public School System. As is our mission, we have all the pieces in place to adapt to the requirements of each our students and their families to foster the development of “knowledgeable, responsible, and caring citizens who embrace life’s possibilities with a passion for continuous learning.”

Let us resolve to make these words come to life for each and every student each and every day.

Brendan Walsh is treasurer of the Grosse Pointe Public School System's Board of Education. A longer version of this essay, with more supporting graphics, may be found at Walsh's blog, Views on Schools.

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