The "More" Child

The last two weeks have been the weeks for high profile school ranking lists, namely the Washington Post/Jay Mathews Challenge Index (brought to you by the company that also owns Newsweek, of “America’s Best High Schools” fame and Kaplan Test Preparation) and the U.S. News and World Report’s America’s Best High Schools. [Aside #1:  Do magazine have "sweeps weeks?" Because this stuff must be a cash cow.  Aside #2:  Does anyone ever read USWR other than their rankings issues?]

As a quick review, the infamous Challenge Index (to quote the source):

measures a public high school’s effort to challenge its students. The formula is simple: Divide the number of Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate or Cambridge tests a school gave by the number of graduating seniors. Tests taken by all students, not just seniors, are counted.

The rating is not a measure of the overall quality of the school but illuminates one factor that many educators consider important and that can favorably affect other factors.

But of course it is taken to be a measure of quality.  And it has been grabbed onto by educators (hello MoCo Superintendent Jerry Weast) with a vengeance.  The underlying belief is that *any* student can benefit from simply being in an AP class,  because it’s, well, an AP class and there’s ostensibly no fudging the “rigor.”

The chief weakness, however, is that the Index is all about the body count.  How many students actually receive a grade that merits college credit is irrelevant.  As the Post put it, (much like Inspector Renault in Casablanca:  “I’m shocked! Shocked!), “… the push for more college-level courses in disadvantaged schools has led to a new and potentially controversial trend. Several schools, particularly in the District and Prince George’s County, are involving large numbers of students in AP classes even though few of them score well enough on the exams to receive college credit.”

In response to this “unconventional use of AP” (Shocked!) Jay created two lists this year, one for schools with a pass rate of 10% or higher, and another for a lower than 10% pass rate.  Egads!  10%? So much for thinking your gifted kid is finally going to find appropriate intellectual peers and academic challenge in high school.  Anyone with a pulse is getting pushed into AP classes.

True to form, MCPS wasted no time in cranking up the multi-million dollar PR machine when results were announced. “Students Set New AP Record” the MCPS website screamed. (For the visually inclined, here’s a link to a .pdf of the AP Data slides.)  “Montgomery:  College Level Tests Grow Fourfold in a Decade” parroted the Post.  And it’s true.  The numbers of tests taken are up (How can they not be when the only choice is AP English or regular 12th grade English?).

But I had a real good laugh yesterday morning at this Weast quote in the Schools Notebook section of the Montgomery Extra, talking about the AP increases:  “Race should not be a predictor.   Socio-economics should not be a predictor.  And the teachers of Montgomery County are proving that.”

What parallel universe is he inhabiting? Had he not, for example, read this? (short version here)

Because I could have predicted without opening the paper which clumps of Montgomery high schools would be highly ranked based precisely on those above mentioned predictors.  Richard Montgomery at the top, because it has a high-powered county-wide IB magnet that skews the numbers.  Bethesda-Chevy Chase (FARMS 8.5%).  Wootten (FARMS 4.7%).  Churchilll (FARMS 2.8%).   Whitman (FARMS 1.9%)  Etc.  All very–ahem–”not diverse.”

More telling is the U.S. News and World ranking, which uses a much more complicated and nuanced calculation.  And what are the only three MCPS schools that made the Gold Medal List?   Why Whitman, Wootten, and Churchill!   And that’s it.  Hmm, no RM on the Best IB School List (what’s up with that?).  No Blair, despite the magnets.  Virginia–and neighboring Fairfax County–absolutely crushed us.

So this is what I mean when I said in a recent comment on another post, Don’t BS me.  Don’t try to convince me that up is down, and down is up.  Does MPCS think I’m stupid?  Well evidently.  So why is the system surprised when I don’t believe what they say, when I don’t believe their assurances and promises?  When I look at their blather about “stakeholders” and “parent involvement” with a jaundiced eye because I know it’s all Grand Kabuki, an elaborate, stylized ritual?  And to be perfectly honest,  “challenge” doesn’t impress me–because there’s never been any question in my mind that my kids are going to take AP classes.  I care about excellence.

My friend who recently gave that testimony on the writing curriculum–or lack thereof–in the Red Zone told me that after she spoke several MCPS official pounced on her with their cards and asked to meet.  When she did, it they marveled at what she had to say.  How novel!  How intriguing!  They had never heard these things!  It was as if they had never actually talked to a real live parent, let alone set foot in a school, so caught up in the lofty policy-making, educational managementese mumbo jumbo were they.  These people are so removed from what is happening on the ground that it might as well be a different universe.