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Old 06-17-2013, 08:14 AM
 
Location: Buffalo
719 posts, read 1,545,185 times
Reputation: 1014

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Genoobie, I don't understand why you feel numbers shouldn't apply to evaluating students and schools. If you don't measure students academic performance by grades and testing, what do you suggest as an alternative? A for effort? Everyone gets a trophy for showing up? College admissions would laugh at this and the brightest child in your perfect school would not get in because they don't have standardized test score to differentiate themselves or have anything quantifiable to show for their years of education.
I attended Williamsville schools and qualified for reduced lunch k-8. My sister and I were raised by single mom who worked as secretary. You don't have to be wealthy, or even close to it, to have your kids in Williamsville. I know of a number of people now who rent apartments in Williamsville School district so their children can attend. Would they be better off in the city? I doubt it, but that's not really my point.
My biggest fear in BPS would be for "Johnny Average" who will not get into Honors. He would go to PS# whatever. In the better districts, Johnny has a much better chance of succeeding because he won't be shoe-horned into a horrible school simply because he isn't exceptional. I'm sure you'd agree that a student surrounded by peers interested in where they might go to college is better than being surrended by students who don't care about graduating HS at all!
No system is perfect, on that I think we can all agree. But the system is what the system is right now. If you want to change BPS that's great but leave the top performing districts out of it because what they're doing has been working and the parents and students see it and appreciate it. That's why we're generally accepting of the higher taxes.
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Old 06-17-2013, 09:24 AM
 
Location: Jamestown, NY
7,840 posts, read 9,138,991 times
Reputation: 13779
Quote:
Originally Posted by genoobie View Post
Either way, you have multiple districts that have done a decent job of creating fairly homogeneous income brackets. Furthermore, the FREE AND REDUCED LUNCH RATE is more or less a measure of socioeconomic status. Not the only factor, but a primary one in determining educational outcomes as measured by standardized assessments. By that measure, Tech and Salamanca are ON PAR. Yet, the results at Tech far outweigh those in Salamanca. If we are going to use numbers to judge the success of a school then in this particular case, the BPS system wouldn't seem to be doing all that poorly, or "suck" as you like to say.

Additionally, find me some rural districts that have the 90% FRL rate as the poorest schools and you will find that their "success" rates are also poor with respect to graduation, etc.

Linda_D, I'm glad you like living where you live. The "good schools" mantra is a dead one. What makes a school "good" should be more than a measure with numbers but this is the system we presently have. So spare me the BPS sucking speech, because the whole system of measurement and school funding / exclusivity model SUCKS and that's not just BPS by the way.



So, de facto, you discriminate based on wealth of homebuyers and real estate values.
Do NOT play stupid, genoobie. Students have to pass an admissions test with a certain score to get into Hutch Tech. Every student in the Salamanca school district who passes 8th grade goes to Salamanca High School. It's the same difference between applying to get into SUNY Buffalo and JCC: one is selective, the other takes everybody who meets minimal qualifications.

Furthermore, Buffalo is NOT the only city with lots of poor people. Every city in the state has more than its fair share of poverty and the problems poverty brings to school districts, but some do a much better job in dealing with them than do others. Buffalo is one of those that doesn't deal with its problems particularly well.

Denying that and excusing it doesn't fix it, and until the schools are fixed, Buffalo will continue to lose young families to the suburbs, both those that move out of the city before their children get to school age and those who never even consider buying homes in the city at all.
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Old 06-17-2013, 12:09 PM
 
252 posts, read 646,930 times
Reputation: 359
Linda, I don't understand how you can simultaneously say that this is good:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Linda_d View Post
If you buy a home in most other school districts in NYS, your home is in an elementary school attendance district and a middle school attendance district.
but this is bad:

Quote:
City Honors is what you get when you "super select" your student body, beginning in fifth grade. Nothing done at City Honors filters down to improve the educational experience of other Buffalo public school students.
There's no difference here, except that one (City Honors) is a selected student body from within a single district and municipality and the other is a selected student body from the wider regional population. It doesn't make any sense to me to decry one and celebrate the other.

If you are a single mother making $16K a year, your kids simply do not have the opportunity to go to Clarence schools, for example. That entire population of students is selected out of those schools.

I can rewrite your quote like this:

"[Clarence Senior High School] is what you get when you "super select" your student body, beginning in [kindergarten]. Nothing done at [Clarence Senior High School] filters down to improve the educational experience of other [Erie County] public school students."

and it would be just as true.
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Old 06-17-2013, 01:39 PM
 
Location: Jamestown, NY
7,840 posts, read 9,138,991 times
Reputation: 13779
Quote:
Originally Posted by JSmith11 View Post
Linda, I don't understand how you can simultaneously say that this is good:



but this is bad:



There's no difference here, except that one (City Honors) is a selected student body from within a single district and municipality and the other is a selected student body from the wider regional population. It doesn't make any sense to me to decry one and celebrate the other.

If you are a single mother making $16K a year, your kids simply do not have the opportunity to go to Clarence schools, for example. That entire population of students is selected out of those schools.

I can rewrite your quote like this:

"[Clarence Senior High School] is what you get when you "super select" your student body, beginning in [kindergarten]. Nothing done at [Clarence Senior High School] filters down to improve the educational experience of other [Erie County] public school students."

and it would be just as true.
What is it with you people? Is there an Eleventh Commandment for all the Buffalo-philes here that says, "Thou shalt defend the policies of the Buffalo Public Schools no matter how indefensible"?

What Clarence spends on its schools has nothing to do with what other school districts spend on their schools. What BPS spends on giving City Honors students an enriched educational experience directly takes $$$ away from what it has to spend on providing education to all BPS students! Right there your analogy breaks down.

Another point: most of Buffalo's first ring suburbs have older neighborhoods with fairly low rents like Sheridan/Parkside in Tonawanda and Cedargrove Circle in Cheektowaga. Investors have also bought up many of the small, older single family homes and older apartment buildings/duplexes in Amherst, Cheektowaga, the Tonawandas, and West Seneca and qualified them for Section 8 rentals. Families that qualify for Section 8 assistance pay only about a quarter of their income for rent, so a single mom earning $16k could afford to live in the Amherst, Kenton, Sweethome, Tonawanda City, Maryvale, Cheektowaga, Depew/Soan or West Seneca school districts -- and her children would get the same educational opportunities all the other kids in the district get.

Furthermore, it's also NOT just poor kids who are impacted by the BPS policy. It's also middle class kids, the ones who didn't get into City Honors from 4th grade or the ones who didn't score well enough on the entrance exam for Hutch Tech. Stop pretending that everybody in the city is poor and everybody in the suburbs is rich. It's simply untrue -- and you know it. You'll find more houses in the $80k-120k price range in the suburbs than you will in the city, and it's those families that leave the city because they don't want to chance their kids getting stuck going to Lafayette or Grover.

Finally, other urban school districts in NYS have problems with poverty. Most do a better job educating most of their students than Buffalo does educating most of theirs. BPS doesn't get a pass simply because it's a poor district, especially when it chooses to give a relative handful of students a first class education and the rest a third class one.
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Old 06-17-2013, 02:25 PM
 
252 posts, read 646,930 times
Reputation: 359
Quote:
Originally Posted by Linda_d View Post
What is it with you people? Is there an Eleventh Commandment for all the Buffalo-philes here that says, "Thou shalt defend the policies of the Buffalo Public Schools no matter how indefensible"?
I've reread my post, and I don't see where I even attempted to defend the policies of the BPS. You have no idea whether I agree with you about whether honors schools like City Honors are a good idea or not.

I simply asked you how you can reconcile your support of de facto selection by schools that segregate by parental income (which is strongly correlated with academic achievement) with your condemnation of schools like City Honors that segregate by demonstrated academic merit.
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Old 06-17-2013, 02:53 PM
 
Location: Buffalo
719 posts, read 1,545,185 times
Reputation: 1014
Quote:
Originally Posted by JSmith11 View Post
I've reread my post, and I don't see where I even attempted to defend the policies of the BPS. You have no idea whether I agree with you about whether honors schools like City Honors are a good idea or not.

I simply asked you how you can reconcile your support of de facto selection by schools that segregate by parental income (which is strongly correlated with academic achievement) with your condemnation of schools like City Honors that segregate by demonstrated academic merit.
Show me please where it is written that Clarence/Williamsville/OP/E.Aurora school districts have an income qualification to attend. The premise for your argument is fatally flawed as no such policy exists. Your perception of these areas is just that - your perception. Reality is there are many lower income familes with children in these districts and they had no entrance requirements to these schools other than their address.
I really can't understand the hostility towards the suburban districts.
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Old 06-17-2013, 03:26 PM
 
252 posts, read 646,930 times
Reputation: 359
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigD_JT_14221 View Post
Show me please where it is written that Clarence/Williamsville/OP/E.Aurora school districts have an income qualification to attend.
Well, show me please the house or apartment in the Clarence school district that is affordable to someone making minimum wage.

The Clarence School District has a free/reduced lunch qualification rate of 8% (379 students out of a total enrollment of 4916).

Williamsville's is 11%. Orchard Park's is 8%. East Aurora's is 7%. Buffalo's is 77%.

So yes, there are *some* lower-income families in these districts. But let's not pretend that these districts are wide open to everyone regardless of income. Because of the type and cost of housing that is available in these towns, and the fact that car ownership is a virtual necessity there, they are essentially closed off to a large number of students.

I'm not even trying to argue (right now, anyway) that this socioeconomic segregation is a bad thing. I'm just curious as to how someone can support this but think that City Honors being selective is a bad thing.

City Honors is an enclave of high performing students with the city of Buffalo whose students are selected by academic achievement. Clarence HS is a similar enclave within Erie County whose students are selected by parental income (closely correlated with academic achievement). There's really not that much difference in concept here.
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Old 06-17-2013, 03:27 PM
 
879 posts, read 1,619,527 times
Reputation: 1102
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigD_JT_14221 View Post
Show me please where it is written that Clarence/Williamsville/OP/E.Aurora school districts have an income qualification to attend. The premise for your argument is fatally flawed as no such policy exists. Your perception of these areas is just that - your perception. Reality is there are many lower income familes with children in these districts and they had no entrance requirements to these schools other than their address.
I really can't understand the hostility towards the suburban districts.
There's not a hostility toward suburban districts. I don't give a darn toot if people want to believe the numbers games.

1) Show me the plethora of housing where low income people are welcomed into Clarence/Wville/OP/EA as well as the transportation?

@Linda_D, I also don't care about the fact that the students at Tech take an entrance exam compared to a place such as Salamanca. The point IS that given LIKE for LIKE (based on socioeconomics) the students at Tech outperform those at Salamanca. That contradicts your point about "Buffalo schools suck." Given like for like in lower income brackets, I am sure BPS is on par with schools across the state. There are a few outliers, but there are likely unique factors.

My point is that the "good schools" mantra is dead.

As far as how SHOULD schools be rated? Schools should be rated on challenging students to think and solve problems that have not yet been solved and perhaps don't even exist. But that model entrusts that teachers play a greater role and standardized tests, which can't effectively measure these kinds of cognitive developments, would play a smaller role. Schools should play to students strengths and challenge their weaknesses so that children GROW. Schools wouldn't be compared to one another because the differences would be very small. It would be a system like our friends to the north have. I rarely hear Canadians talking about where they want to live because of schools.

The college drop-out rate is skyrocketing and just because you got a 1300/1600 on the SAT does not mean you are necessarily college ready. Colleges and careers should be decoupled, i.e. education for it's own sake. Likely this would cause a drop in college enrollments, so don't give me the line about "valuing education". "Good education" defined by most of the posters on the board simply means better access to the higher paying careers. The words "better educated" means "better connected" and therefore "better access."

I also think the college competition thing is a wash. As high school curricula have been watered down, so too have colleges and thus the calculus at Harvard is scarcely different than the calculus at ECC. In fact, a good book will suffice in either case, so what are you actually paying for? Largely? CREDENTIALING.

Quote:
If you want to change BPS that's great but leave the top performing districts out of it because what they're doing has been working and the parents and students see it and appreciate it. That's why we're generally accepting of the higher taxes.
I will as soon as people stop beating the dead horse of "good schools." What the "good schools" have been doing is perpetuating the status quo (as have "bad schools"). I'm glad your mom was able to find that job. I don't know that in today's economy she would have been so lucky. That's really what finding a living wage job has more or less amounted to in the economy today.

Until you fix wage inequity, you will have disparately achieving schools.

As far as extra money going to City Honors that is largely because of a well connected alumni organization. I don't think the school gets much more than many others.

Linda_D, do you have ANY idea what the waiting list is for section 8? Do you have ANY idea what the availability of units are in the "qualified sections" of Amherst are? What makes you think those areas are any better than areas of Buffalo? Just because your kids go to "Amherst Schools", which would in this case be SweetHome Middle and High School?

Of course, as more of these areas qualify for section 8 Linda, more people are moving out, thus depressing property values, causing tax revenues to drop. So it will only be a matter of a few short years before suburban districts have to begin pruning the "specialized" programs that you tout as being the difference b/w city and suburban.

Quote:
Finally, other urban school districts in NYS have problems with poverty. Most do a better job educating most of their students than Buffalo does educating most of theirs.
I'd like some proof of this, and define what you mean by "better". I don't know that many urban districts are wrestling with the severity of poverty that Buffalo has. Not trying to one up anyone, but I'd like to see some clarification.

Stop pretending that you can't find decent housing for less than half to one third than the high end suburbs. There's also more schools like DaVinci, Middle College, etc.
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Old 06-17-2013, 05:59 PM
 
Location: Buffalo
719 posts, read 1,545,185 times
Reputation: 1014
Dispute this: Buffalo Schools Graduation Rate Now Below 50% | wgrz.com
Now tell me again why I'd intentionally opt for city schools over Williamsville, Clarence, OP, E. Aurora or really any suburb out there.
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Old 06-17-2013, 07:18 PM
 
879 posts, read 1,619,527 times
Reputation: 1102
Quote:
Originally Posted by BigD_JT_14221 View Post
Dispute this: Buffalo Schools Graduation Rate Now Below 50% | wgrz.com
Now tell me again why I'd intentionally opt for city schools over Williamsville, Clarence, OP, E. Aurora or really any suburb out there.
There is no disputing it. The graduation rate is about 50% in 4 years. At 5 years it's about 75%. Because there is no longer a local diploma, there are required Regents exams, again, the success rate which tracks income very closely.

1) Not all high schools have this graduation rate. Some are as high as 95% some as low as 30%.

2) If you care about your kids' education, they will graduate and on time, not necessarily because of the schools but because of involved parenting and your concern that they value education, hopefully beyond the narrow view of getting a "good" job.

3) With the $120K or so that you'd save by living in the city and sending your kids to a decent school (the entrance exams aren't really that difficult and yes there are decent schools), they'd get a decent education, free college tuition, and you could use the near $180K to provide some legacy savings to your kids because in the new economy the jobs will be fairly scarce. Heck, you might even spend a bit for private lessons, trips overseas, etc. But what do I know, city living isn't for everyone. Just for people who can see the value of a dollar and going beyond schools to become educated.
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