Rethinking School Assessment: 7th Grade Math TCAP Performance in Pueblo

Did anyone notice the Chieftain softening its tone in their editorial this morning? They acknowledge that “external, socioeconomic factors” can impact student performance. Of course, they can’t admit any error in their rush to judgement so they quickly remind us that even if a child is deprived of adequate food, shelter and a supportive family it “does not preclude him or her from learning entirely” as if to say, now that we’ve acknowledged students don’t do as well if they’re hungry we feel entitled to revert back to our grumpy stance regarding the failures of D60 since their union is, generally speaking, opposed to our political agenda.

Sort of like the Grinch giving Suzy-Who a drink of water and sending her back to bed before continuing to rob her home.

Oh well. I suppose I should be happy they included the word “socioeconomic” in the conversation. In any case, if you missed my first few posts in this series go back and read these before exploring my Middle School rankings further below.

• Part 1: District 60 Educates More Students Receiving Free Lunch than the Entire Student Population in District 70.
• Part 2: Math TCAP Scores are Highly Correlated with % of Students Receiving Free or Reduced Lunch throughout Colorado.
• Part 3: D60 and D70 both have outstanding schools. It’s not as one-sided as you’ve been led to believe.

And now, here are my rankings of Pueblo’s public Middle Schools in terms of Math Teaching Effectiveness as demonstrated during 2014 TCAP testing. If you haven’t already you’ll want to be sure and read Part 3 to better understand the methodology for coming up with the TEI values.

• Gold Medal: Goodnight Elementary School (D60)
• Silver Medal: Pleasant View Middle School (D70)
• Bronze Medal: The Connect (D70)
• Honorable Mention: Corwin International (D60), Craver Middle School (D70) and Beulah Middle School (D70)

Congratulations to all the hard-working teachers and staff at these Middle Schools!

And, I’ll repeat my suggestion…

Note to School Administrators: Let’s reward the teachers at these schools with more resources and higher compensation levels. And let’s involve these teachers when it comes time to plot a strategy and implement tactics to raise performance at schools on the bottom of the list.

 

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