George Rebane
I don’t know whether that overstates the case, but in any event it’s not that far off. Reading this morning’s lead piece ‘STAR tests’ in the 18aug11 Union, I was a little put off by the reporter’s opening attempt at logic.
Despite efforts across western Nevada County to improve student test scores, money still matters in the realm of student achievement.
Districts where property values and household income tend to be higher — and where affordable housing is less available — did the best in results of California's Standardized Testing and Reporting program, or STAR, which were released this week.
Since the government can't make more well-to-do parents, the implication here is that we need to continue increasing the per student spending to improve the learning levels of our students. This policy, of course, has not helped during the last forty years, but then it is the only progressive answer – ‘stasis is good’. The correlation of household income to student performance has been explained in countless studies – in the aggregate, better earning parents are better educated and therefore support their chidren's education more, which yields better students.
Just so you don’t misunderstand my stand on this, let me say it straight out – we don’t have a student learning crisis, we have a long standing teacher crisis; it is time to get the dummies out of our classrooms, and attract good teaching talent into our schools. And for icing on the cake, I really do believe that it has been the agenda and accomplishment of this country’s progressives to get unqualified teachers into the profession and keep them there through support of the teachers’ unions. It's called voter development.
After reading the article I was going to launch into an extended harangue about how Nevada County schools are screwing up. Family matters intervened and we had to take our last grandkid to the airport to conclude what has been an extended week of enjoying some of our own arrows into the future. By the time we got back, most of my points had been co-opted pretty well by readers in the wild comment stream to ‘An Evening with the Tea Party Patriots'. The points there made are worth their own focus and discussion, so I am including here below a few selected and unedited comments (please go to the linked post to see other related comments).
*** Let's look at the STAR results for Nevada County…
First, we've historically the most Euro of any county in California, and the fewest ESL students. So we must be doing pretty good in English-Language Arts, right? Well, for our 11th graders, 54% are below grade level.
We might expect our math scores to be worse, and we would be right.
The 6th grade is the last year before the most advanced students split away from the general track, and at that point, 45% are below grade level (Proficient) in Nevada County.
The creme de la creme take Algebra I in the 7th grade (about one in twelve) and they do pretty well, and kids who are on track take it in the 8th grade.The county-wide Algebra I numbers show 66% are below Proficient when tested.
More county wide totals:
Geometry… 63% below Proficient
Algebra II… 68% below Proficient
Don't blame the high schools, the problems start in the elementary schools. If the kid can't write well or manipulate fractions without a calculator, they're entering high school with major handicaps.
Looking at the Grass Valley School District numbers, 48% of 6th graders are below Proficient in Math. Don't be too hard on them, though, since when STAR testing first started, after the Jon Byerrum experiment in whole math and whole language had a few years to take hold, fully half of their 3rd graders (the first class to get whole math with both barrels) were in the bottom quartile in both math and language.
I understand from The Union and KNCO that County Sup. of Education Holly Hermansen is studying the results to see just where the problems are in our schools, but I expect Ms. Hermansen (aka Mrs. Jon Byerrum) has her eyes wide shut as to the root causes.
Posted by: Greg Goodknight | 18 August 2011 at 11:15 AM
*** Here's a good one… NU Technical High School, the school within a school at our large comprehensive high school. 93% of the 15 kids in that group (meaning all but one) are below proficient in English. Fully 53% are Far Below Basic.
NU Tech seems to me to be a holding pen to take kids at risk of making the NUHS stats worse and putting them somewhere to isolate NUHS from that, while still allowing NU to get their daily cash for taking attendance.
Posted by: Greg Goodknight | 18 August 2011 at 11:36 AM
[On another matter, Russ Steele continues to highlight the frenetic desire of the local left to insert themselves into NC TPP affairs. All this attention to a movement they consider withering and worthless is quite remarkable. gjr]
*** I just posted this at NC Media Watch: Tea Party Patriots — Not a political party, but a state of mind
Our local left is "going postal" as the local Tea Party gains recognition in the community. The TPP was the largest group in the 4th of July Parade. The Tea Party Patriots are holding monthly events, including dinners, luncheons, free movies on critical issues, holding idea exchange forums, hosted a County Fair Booth, and are developing a strong presence on Facebook. They are every where, including attending BOS meetings and meeting one-on-one with Supervisors, City Council members and our local newspaper Publisher.
For some reason, the left is upset by this expanding visibility of the Tea Party Patriots in our community. They keep posting about polling information reported to show declining interest in the Tea Party and what they stand for:
You can read the rest of the post HERE.
Posted by: Russ Steele | 18 August 2011 at 01:38 PM
rebanesruminations.com 
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