New York City schools are doing something different. They've given students school report cards to take home to their parents. The purpose? According to School Chancellor Ramon Cortines, parents can "use the Annual School Report ... to ask better questions of the leadership of their local schools." The high school reports include the number of students in the school, percent graduating, percentage who meet state reading and math requirements, average attendance, number of pupil suspensions per 100 students, student-staff ratio, percentage of teachers with five or fewer years of experience, SAT scores and the number of librarians and guidance counselors. The idea is a good one and shows an openness that is often missing in our schools.
Students were given only the report card for their own schools. The idea is not to compare the schools with one another but rather to see what progress each school makes over time. Of course, since this is the first year the reports have been issued, no such longitudinal comparisons are possible. New York City newspapers published substantial parts of the high school reports and did just what they were not supposed to do: list schools that were the best and the worst on given indicators.
What's wrong with comparing schools? Nothing, if the schools are comparable. But newspapers simply listed the schools with top scores and those with bottom scores in reading, math, SATs, etc. Some schools, like top-scoring Stuyvesant, Bronx Science and Townsend Harris, select their students mainly by competitive examination and admit only top scorers. Other schools admit all comers. Comparing these schools is like comparing a group of athletes who have been chosen to compete in the Olympics with a group of students in a typical gym class. Is a school with high reading and math scores a good school? Is one with low scores a bad school? What if the students in the high-scoring school already had those high scores when they were admitted and have made no progress since then? And what if the students in the low-scoring school came in with much lower scores but have made great progress? Shouldn't we judge a school on the basis of the educational value it adds rather than the students it starts with?
There are other indicators that are hard to interpret -- student suspensions, for example. Some schools suspended 15 or 16 students out of each 100 at some time during the year; others suspended none. Most people would say that schools with low suspension rates are better: A high rate would mean there's lots of trouble in the school, and a low rate would be a sign of tranquility. But that's not necessarily the case. A high suspension rate can also mean that the principal of the school is serious about keeping violent and disruptive students from destroying the education of those who want to learn. And a low suspension rate could mean the principal is covering up school problems. There's no way of knowing from the numbers alone.
Staff ratios vary widely. Some schools have almost 20 students for each teacher, administrator and other professional in the school. Others have 10. One would guess that fewer students per adult is better, but a school may have more adults because it has more problems. Also, some schools use the staff to keep class sizes down, while others use staff for various administrative functions. Why not let parents know the average class size in each school and the number of classes that are very large?
The report card also gives student turnover rates -- that is, the percent of students in the school who were there for the full year. On average, 70.6 percent of the students in city high schools were in one school for the full year, but in some schools the percent was only 40 or 50 percent. When 30 to 60 percent of the students tested for reading and math attend a school for just a few months, test scores don't tell you anything about the amount of learning that's taking place in that school. A school with half of its kids moving in and out each year is not likely to be one in which much learning takes place, but the schools cannot be blamed for problems beyond their control.
The report card also documents what years of budget cuts have meant. Many high schools have no librarians or counselors. Eighty-one of the 121 high schools for which report cards were issued have no librarian. Thirty-two have either no counselors or only one. One high school has one counselor for over 1,000 students!
The New York City School Report Card is a good beginning. With some improvements and the opportunity to gather longitudinal data, it could become a valuable tool for the educating and involving the public in the improvement of the schools.