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Season 3, Episode 8 - Star Ratings
99 Plays2 years ago
The "Star Ratings" are out for Nevada schools and the data is not good. But how do they even come up with this data and what is NOT SAID in the star rating and scores. Enjoy as the concept is broken down and decide if you need to question the validity of the schools' ratings.
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Transcript
Introduction to School Star Ratings
00:00:11
Speaker
The star ratings are out and you may or may not know what your school is rated. That is today's topic. As we get back to the podcast, it's all about perspective. I am, of course, your host, Robert Hinchliffe. And I'm going to talk about the star ratings, which I don't know if, you know, how many teachers are
00:00:28
Speaker
really the community, how many of you really know about them? Because other than data insight partners, there hasn't been much news about it. So let's look
Criticism of CCSD's Promotion of Star Ratings
00:00:37
Speaker
into it. Really, honestly, this is going to be an interesting podcast because I'm going to say some honest things is I don't think CCSD wants you to know what they are because the results are not good.
00:00:49
Speaker
Very few people are talking about them. Very few people are celebrating. I'll get into the data on that. And it's just not a very good system. So let's discuss that today. And I want to put this out there before I even start. Ultimately,
00:01:05
Speaker
No matter what, we got to do better. All of us have to do better. There's no school that's perfect. There's no school with the perfect rating. We all have to do better. And that is our goal at Thompson. So if you are a school that has a star rating and you know it, then take a look at it and see how you can do better. But let's dive in. Let's take a look at
00:01:30
Speaker
how it basically is made, the good and the bad of it. And then you can decide, you can find your perspective on whether or not you agree that we should even have the star rating system based upon the way they have it set up.
Evaluation of Star Rating Criteria
00:01:43
Speaker
When we look at the star system, it's based on a few items, including SBACS, WIDA and attendance. And that makes it very, very difficult because
00:01:56
Speaker
There's basically three assessments, I'm sorry, two assessments and then attendance. And we're gonna get into all three of those. However, the first problem really seems to be that the ranges for where your school land make absolutely no sense. The system takes the SBAC and the WIDA, which is for the ELL students and your overall chronic absenteeism, and they combine it into this formula
00:02:24
Speaker
and then they give you points based upon that. And the amount of points you get determines which range you fall into. Okay, that makes sense, no problem there. The problem is, let's take a look at the ranges. If you are 84 and above, so it's out of 100, if you're 84 points and above, you're a five star school, which they say is fabulous, you are amazing, you're doing everything right, you essentially are the cream of the crop. That's debatable, which we'll get into.
00:02:54
Speaker
Next up is 67 to 83, that's four stars. Then we have 50 to 66, that's three stars. Then, this is where it gets weird, more weird, is from 27 to 49, that's two stars. And from zero to 26 is one star.
00:03:17
Speaker
My first question really is, why is it not 20, 40, 60, 80, 100? Why isn't it just easy? Nothing's ever easy, but this makes no sense. Why is 84 the cut score? It makes no sense. If you look at the amount of schools, which I'm gonna get into that actually are four stars or five stars, why, again, I keep coming up, why is it 84? Why is it 67?
00:03:47
Speaker
Why is 50 and above a three-star school? So essentially, three-star school is average.
Emotional Impact of Star Ratings
00:03:55
Speaker
It's an average old school. Well, if you're getting half the points, you're not average on a high school grading scale. A 50 is an F in high school. But if you get a 50 on the star rating, you're average. It's like getting a C.
00:04:12
Speaker
I don't understand that. Even more confusing is that between 27 and 49, that's a range of 22 points. So the five star, four star, three star are all about 16. Then this two star is a range of 22 points total. And one star is a range of 26 points total.
00:04:34
Speaker
So zero to 49, essentially you're a one to two star school. Well, the law of averages is going to have the majority of the schools below that probably.
00:04:48
Speaker
It's just the range, it's just basic math. If the range from zero to 50 is one and two stars, but the range from 50 to 100 is three, four and five, that makes absolutely no sense. So just the ranges itself is the first area of concern when we look at the star ratings. Okay, I'm getting fired up. This is a good one though, because principals just want simplicity. We just want clarity and we just want equity.
00:05:17
Speaker
And essentially, just alone in the ranges, there's none of that. But let's look into it. When I get the scores for my school, Tyrone Thompson, which I'm gonna talk about, it's a time when you're like, ugh.
00:05:35
Speaker
Or you're like, yes, if you're five stars, you're like, oh yes, we're five stars, let's celebrate. Post it all over the internet. You're plastering it on Twitter, showing it on Dojo D Community. Look at us, like chest puffed out, like we're five stars. You are the best. Life's great. If you're four stars, it depends. If you were five stars last year and now you're four, you're like, oh man, this is not good. I've been there. As Smith, we were five, we dropped to four. And you're like, oh why, we dropped to four. Oh my gosh.
00:06:05
Speaker
Then you have other people on the other side, the other perspectives. Jeff Granger is thrilled that they are three stars at Shirley Barber. He was our guest a couple of weeks ago. He's thrilled because they made so much gains going from two to three in a tough neighborhood. He is ecstatic about being a three-star school and great job at Barber for that.
00:06:31
Speaker
myself, Tyrone Thompson, we are a three-star school and it drives me crazy. I did not sign up to be second.
00:06:40
Speaker
I did not sign up to not be first. Obviously, I just said that. Second sucks. Second is the first loser, in my opinion. If you did not sign up to be number one, why are you here? If you don't wanna be the best, why are you doing this? That's really my struggle is we've gotta be careful not to celebrate mediocrity. But yet, when you look at the ranges, three stars,
00:07:08
Speaker
50 to 66 is kind of mediocre. So you get caught in this trap. Really ultimately it comes down to your viewpoint. Again, Thompson, I am not okay with three stars. The staff knows this, we gotta do better until every kid is proficient. If that's possible, which I'll get into in a little bit, we have work to do. We have to do good and have to do great for all kids. Okay, looking into this, like I said,
00:07:37
Speaker
It really depends on your perspective. Some schools that went from two to one, they're devastated. They've worked their tails off. And then all of a sudden now, boom, you're one star. It's frustrating. It's hurtful to the teachers who pour their sweat and blood into these kids. But at the same point in time, I'm going to get into the idea of if this is a fair system.
00:08:02
Speaker
I will fully admit, life's not fair. It is one of the things I tell my kids when something bad happens to them, I say, life's not fair. This system isn't either. And that's okay. It's the system we have, we have to deal with it, we have to be a part of it. Okay, let's accept that. However, let's at least take a look at the system and let's judge it on its merits.
00:08:30
Speaker
There's a few things that really factor in here in the grand scheme of things that I'm gonna cover.
Factors Affecting Star Ratings
00:08:38
Speaker
Every principal, elementary, I'm sticking elementary, I only know elementary, even though the ranges for middle school I think are a little crazier, but elementary speaking, every elementary principal, probably every principal can agree that chronic absenteeism should not be included in this metric.
00:08:58
Speaker
If the kid is not at school, we can basically have a carnival every day and those kids won't come. We can do whatever we want. They're not going to walk the mile or 1.9 miles in Vegas. They're just not going to. Okay. That's not our fault that mom and dad won't drive them or can't drive them.
00:09:22
Speaker
But yet we are punished because parents or kids are not making the effort to get to school. At Thompson, I actually have a parent who hates traffic, the traffic at Thompson's terrible. I agree. Everybody agrees. He basically said I'm not bringing my kid to school because I don't want to deal with the traffic.
00:09:41
Speaker
I can't control that, but guess what? As soon as that student misses 18 days this year, they're going to be chronically absent for the entire year no matter what. Chronic absenteeism in elementary school is 98% not the school's fault.
00:09:58
Speaker
Sometimes you have a teacher that makes kids not want to come. Sometimes your environment might not be the best. But in the end, the vast majority of elementary students want to come to school. It's just whether or not people will get them there. Also, in Vegas, you could basically say, well, the buses aren't getting them either. That's true. That's true. The bus system is a problem as well. So
00:10:21
Speaker
There's three factors right there. One, the parents don't wanna get them. Two, the buses might not be working right. Or three, they don't like traffic and they don't wanna deal with it. All of those things equal chronic absenteeism numbers going up, which equals punishing the elementary schools. That being said, here are some things that people aren't gonna like. Special programs.
00:10:48
Speaker
are a huge factor in the unfairness, again, I'm using that word, of the STAR system. At Tyrone Thompson, we have three intermediate programs that counted last year. We have intermediate STAR, we have intermediate SLD, and we have intermediate autism. That's 27 kids. Out of the 27, one was able to pass the math SPAC.
00:11:18
Speaker
Again, the SBAC is the assessment that we do. It's a very hard test, very difficult for any student, let alone one with a severe learning disability or one who may have autism that's very challenging when it comes to just basic test taking.
00:11:40
Speaker
or a student that has behaviors. They don't want to take it. They don't care. Doesn't matter. They still have to take the S back and their scores still count. So when you look at the three intermediate programs, that's one out of 27 that passed. And I mean this in the most loving, caring way, but the test is hard for a
00:12:04
Speaker
quote unquote, normal third grader. So imagine a third grader with a severe learning disability. It's next to impossible. It's not fair that students who have a genuine, severe learning disability have to take this test and it's counted against our proficiency rate. All right, so you look at that. Thompson has three programs. Some schools have none.
00:12:34
Speaker
How is that equitable? How is that fair? Why do we get them? Even though I asked for them, honestly, I asked for SLD last year. I didn't care about the SBAC scores. I cared about the kids. That was what is important. But when you look at the grand scheme of the NSPF, the Nevada School Proficiency Framework,
00:12:54
Speaker
One school has three programs, the other school might have three primary programs. None of those kids take the S back. It doesn't calculate in to the star ratings. That's one area that really I think is in need of examination. Going along with special programs, magnet schools. Magnet schools have no special programs.
00:13:18
Speaker
Magnet schools also have the ability, although I don't know that they exercise it every time. Magnet school principals, email me, let me know, come on the podcast, you're always welcome to debate the issues. Magnet schools have the ability to not ask for students to come back the following year if they're difficult or unsuccessful. That doesn't seem quite equitable to a public school that doesn't have that ability.
00:13:46
Speaker
I don't know. Again, magnet principals, let me know, but my knowledge base or what I know from a previous teacher who had a student in a magnet school in Las Vegas is you have no intermediate programs, no special programs. You might have a pre-K program, but you also have the ability essentially to say, we would prefer that Joe Schmo does not come back next year.
00:14:15
Speaker
Of course, I could be wrong. It's not all kids. I would hope that they would not send all kids packing, but that's definitely a factor. So in all honesty, when we hear that magnet schools are flagship schools, it honestly, um,
00:14:33
Speaker
It's not the nicest for us who don't have magnets, who have special programs, who have every kid in our zone. So I'm just putting that out there again, just being honest. If you don't believe me, come from a magnet to a regular school, or if I'm wrong, maybe I should get a magnet. Either way, that's a factor. So magnet schools, of course, are usually successful.
00:14:59
Speaker
Another variable, some schools are on the COSA list, change of school assignment at Tyrone Thompson. We have 160 COSA kids, maybe more, but the last account I knew was 160.
School Choice and Affluency Impact
00:15:17
Speaker
In the vast majority of those students, many
00:15:22
Speaker
are looking for a better school. Many parents, it's basically school choice. Many parents are choosing a school that meets their needs. So when you look at that, oftentimes those schools come, those kids are leaving a school that may not have met their needs, so they might not be proficient, and they're coming to our school or other coast of schools, and we then basically take on their statistics. An example.
00:15:49
Speaker
Out of the 160 COSA kids at my school, let's just break it in half. 80 are in third, fourth and fifth. Now let's break it to where half of those are not proficient.
00:16:02
Speaker
Right? So now I'm already at a 50% proficiency rate right there before we even start. And then if you add in the special programs, hypothetically, I'm 51 out of 127. That's not going to be enough because you need to be around 60%. When you break this down, there's just so many factors and it's hard to explain it quickly on a podcast, but the students that are moving into your zone matter.
00:16:29
Speaker
They matter greatly. Those parents are, they are choosing a school that they think fits the needs of their kids better. And that's fine. I love, I love, love that 160 parents have 160 kids have been chosen or their parents have chose to come to our school. They think it's great. You walk in the door. We do the best we can with them, no matter who you are. However, when you look at the framework, those kids
00:16:56
Speaker
they come in at a second grade level in third grade, there's a slim chance that we're going to be able to catch them up enough to pass the SBAC. So again, COSA is another factor. We no longer choose who walks in our buildings when it comes to COSA. You get what you get, which is fine. The kids need to be there. We teach them no matter what. But ultimately, if you get
00:17:18
Speaker
If you get 75% of the kids that can pass, you're looking great. If 75% of the students are not proficient when they walk in the door, this is gonna hurt your numbers. And it also helps the schools out either way, or it could hurt them that they came from. If a school loses 75% of their proficient students,
00:17:39
Speaker
They're gonna suffer on their side. If a school loses 75% of their non-proficient students, they're going to grow on their side, hypothetically. Again, just little nuances that the public does not know, or most people really. You can also get into the idea of affluency. I don't care who you are. If you are a realist in education, affluency matters.
00:18:09
Speaker
The SBAC, the students just basically show that they are proficient at the grade level they're in. The vast majority of schools that are four or five star schools are in affluent neighborhoods or they're magnet schools.
00:18:26
Speaker
Affluency matters. Who are the parents that are taking their kids to magnet schools? They're the parents that care. They're the parents that want better for their kids. Not to say the other ones don't want better. They might just not have the ability. Or they might not hit the lottery for the magnet school. It's another thing. We don't have a lottery. You get what you get, what walks in your door. If they're in your zone or on a coast, you take them. Just little factors. Little factors.
00:18:54
Speaker
You also could be in a part of town that has a huge second language population. I think there's some schools out there that might even be 100% ESL, English as Second Language. If you just take a look at a school that's a one-star school, you might think, ooh, they're not very good. What if that one-star school has
00:19:22
Speaker
100% second language learners, and they've been doing amazing things with those students, but they're not caught up enough to be proficient. It's a variable the public doesn't look at, they don't think of. And again, I'm just trying to make it public. There are so many factors that go into the STAR rating system that may or may not be equitable.
00:19:49
Speaker
When you also look at second language students, they don't count till the second year. But if a fifth grader moves here from Russia and they don't speak English, no, let's go ahead. If a third grader moves here from Russia and they don't speak English,
00:20:07
Speaker
Are they able to gain the language enough by fourth grade when they count to be proficient on a fourth grade SBAC? My guess is it's highly unlikely. It can happen, I've seen it happen, but it's difficult because the fourth grade SBAC is difficult. So again, second language students, they could grow immensely and many schools are doing a great job with that, but it won't show up on the SBAC. It might show up on the WIDA, which is included.
00:20:36
Speaker
But again, it's going to hurt your proficiency scores. That's not fair. Those kids are working. They're working hard. They're gaining the language. They have to speak two languages, many of them. They're growing, but they can't pass an S back. And so we're going to punish the school, even though the school is making them grow. Doesn't make sense.
Limitations of the Star Rating System
00:21:02
Speaker
Let's also take a look at the fact that
00:21:06
Speaker
Two more points here and then I'm going to move into another area. It doesn't have anything to do with the growth mindset model. It does not test grit, perseverance. It doesn't tell if a kid overcomes adversity. In high school, it might not say if a kid is basically working two jobs to support his family and going to school and still being successful. There's a lot to it.
00:21:32
Speaker
So when we look at that, that's another area I think that hurts because if we're growing successful humans, that is one of the great things about being a successful school. Yet it's not in any of the data that the public sees. It is only in the community that the school serves that they would know you're producing excellent humans. It's another problem. It doesn't take into account any of the life skills that you need to be successful as you move on.
00:22:02
Speaker
Finally, schools that have multiple subs can't hire anybody. A student in fourth grade hypothetically has 180 days. Let's say that they show up for 150. They might have 100 different subs. How in the world can you punish the school
00:22:24
Speaker
for that situation when there's nobody to hire. Because I guarantee you every principal who has a vacancy, if there was someone good to hire, they would hire them and put them in fourth grade so that they have a chance to pass or show growth. Again, it's punishing the school for factors that they cannot control. Last, the data is skewed clear throughout this. So a student,
00:22:54
Speaker
In third grade is non-proficient. They're chronically absent. They're a minority. They're going to hit you in many areas. If they're second language and they don't grow, they're going to hit you in many areas. They're not going to be proficient in the ELA portion. They're not going to be proficient in the math portion. They're probably not going to show growth in the WIDA. Again, this is an example student. There's other examples on the other side that pass.
00:23:20
Speaker
Then they're chronically absent, boom, that's four areas right there. Their gaps, they're not closing the achievement gap for minorities, that will hit you. So that's five areas that one third grader, oh, and third grade not proficient, did I say that? Essentially, there's so many areas that one student can get you in that that is difficult. If you look at a fifth grader, hypothetically,
00:23:46
Speaker
They're not proficient in ELA, they're not proficient in math, they're not proficient in science. They are chronically absent and they aren't growing. They're Hispanic, they're not growing on the WIDA and they're not closing their opportunity gap. That's six areas that students just hit you. That's hard.
00:24:07
Speaker
It's hard, and again, there's a flip side. There's other students who come in who are in all those categories and they pass, but if we're being honest, which is what the whole idea is here, those are some pretty tough odds to overcome given some certain circumstances, just is what it is. The data also is worthless in many ways because it does not tell us where they are struggling at. It'll tell you a strand
00:24:33
Speaker
but that strand might encompass 12 standards. Well, you're low in math, okay? Where? Well, we're not gonna tell you. Think of this, you took a driving test and you failed, and the instructor says, ah, you failed. Well, what did I do wrong? Well, you failed driving.
00:24:55
Speaker
Okay, there's no feedback. There's not any specific feedback.
Public Perception vs. Reality
00:25:00
Speaker
He didn't say you failed parallel parking. He didn't say that you failed parking on a hill. He didn't say you failed switching lanes. You just failed at parking. That's what the SBAC is really like. Or you can take a sports analogy. Hey, let's look at the growth. Hey, you grew, you grew in football. Oh, how did I get better? Why you just grew in football? There's no specifics on the SBAC data to help us as a school see where we're falling down.
00:25:26
Speaker
So you take all of those, I don't wanna say negatives, all of those factors, when you look at SBACs or WEDA or chronic absenteeism, they all factor in to a score that then goes into ranges that make no sense. And you are then publicly judged on that one score by everybody who has no idea what you're doing. Okay, let's take a look at Tyrone Thompson.
00:25:55
Speaker
We earned 62 points out of 100. Another factor is our chronic absenteeism. We got 3.5 points out of 10. Our chronic absenteeism rate was 17.1%. The district, I believe, was 39. We were 22 points better than the district, but we only got 3.5 points.
00:26:21
Speaker
So they're not grading on a curve or anything like that. It's just a flat that you're 17.1, that equals 3.5. Make it make sense, you can't. The vast majority of the schools lost 10 points on attendance because their chronic absenteeism was so bad. Also, like I said, we got hit by so many students in ELA, that's where we fell down. Well, okay, great, we can work on ELA, but what?
00:26:51
Speaker
You know what? We don't know. We have no idea. So we're just going to work on all of ELA. Maybe that's by design. I don't know. All
Proposed Changes to Star Ratings
00:27:00
Speaker
right. So how do we fix it? I'm already running off. Goodness gracious. How do we fix it? Number one, we have to eliminate the attendance factor in elementary school. It's not fair. The affluent kids tend to go to school, even though, even though they do take trips to Paris or they take cruises, that's fine, but they don't ever have 18 absences most likely.
00:27:20
Speaker
They're not going on three, seven, eight trips during the school year. They do miss school, but are they chronically absent? Probably not. We have to eliminate attendance. We have to do a true growth model somehow. This is why I'm a proponent of MAP. Some people hate MAP, fine. We have to get rid of SBAC and we have to go straight to MAP. Is a teacher growing kids from the first day to the last day?
00:27:48
Speaker
If they're growing kids, great. Is the grade level growing kids? Great. Is the school growing kids? Great. Is the school growing kids over time? Great. We have to measure it that way because we are in control of those factors. Is the student, oh, and it should be only the kids at school. So hypothetically, if Thompson is growing all the kids who are not chronically absent, what more do you want?
00:28:17
Speaker
If Thompson is not growing all the kids who are chronically absent, that's on us. If it's not growing the kids who are not chronically absent, that's on us. If we have a 95% attendance rate and 45% of our kids are showing the right amount of growth, that's on us. There's ways to make this equal and it's the growth model through math. If you don't like math, fine.
00:28:43
Speaker
But let's just go down to three maps a year and let's base it off of that. That would show if your second language kids are growing. That would show what kids are growing in math. You can throw the science piece in there. Why can't we just go straight to a growth? Because what that'll do is the schools that are working their tails off down in the difficult areas with second language students who are growing those kids, but they're not proficient,
00:29:12
Speaker
It will show that they are doing a great job and they will get five stars as compared to schools who are out in the suburbs or the rich areas who are not growing kids. Kids are just stagnant. They would go down to one or two star schools because they're not growing kids. It's a much better equivalent system. Will they change? No, I don't think they will.
00:29:38
Speaker
And also, I would like to add like three, four, and five is SPACs, elementary. Well, if we go math, let's go K5, let's do them all. Is every grade level growing kids? That would be great if we could just go to that. We got to eliminate SPAC, go to map or some other assessment, eliminate both, although maps tied in now to HM8, so that's not going anywhere. But again, when you look in totality,
00:30:08
Speaker
at all of this. The public isn't informed. They don't know. Tyrone Thompson, we have a great environment. The community loves us. They love the teachers. What are they gonna see? They're gonna see 62 and three stars. And they're gonna think, oh, that's not good. Well, that school is great though. They agree, but 62 is very mediocre. So if you're in Northwest and you look up Tyrone Thompson and they got 62, you're like, oh, they're mediocre.
00:30:37
Speaker
They're three stars, they're just medium. In reality, we think we're great. A little biased, obviously. Another thing the public does not see is that we had those three intermediate programs. Six out of 13 teachers were new to grades three, four, and five last year. The teacher in SLD was new. We had a new star program, and then we had all of the COSA kits. They don't see that. All they see is 62 out of 100, three stars.
00:31:07
Speaker
there's gotta be a better system. Ultimately though, as I said, when you open up your star report or you look up your school, some of you may celebrate two stars, some of you may celebrate five, some of you may hate four, but in the end everybody, as you know, it's all about perspective. Thanks very much, have a good week.