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Location: The place where the road & the sky collide
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Quote:
Originally Posted by johnc48
Student performance on educational testing depends greatest on two factors: Parent educational attainment and family income. Those two factors outweigh all other factors combined. The school attendance zones that have the greatest number of high income families and families with high parent educational attainment (factors often overlapping) will have the highest student test achievement.
There's a title one elementary school in Kings Mountain that is a blue ribbon school. However parental involvement is high.
Student performance on educational testing depends greatest on two factors: Parent educational attainment and family income. Those two factors outweigh all other factors combined. The school attendance zones that have the greatest number of high income families and families with high parent educational attainment (factors often overlapping) will have the highest student test achievement.
So basically - high concentration of wealthier/more educated parents = better school. And an individual child from a wealthier/educated family would likely do just as well at a school closer to average. Therefore, most schools is the Charlotte metro will serve a child well.
People ask about schools continually on this board. The only non-subjective answer is school rankings. To varying degrees the rankings lean on test scores. I suggested US News because it's recent & seems to be in the same ballpark as other rankings that I've seen. There are a lot of schools in the area that didn't get ranked. I have no answer for that as I don't work for US News.
If I recall correctly, the highest ranked area school was Highland in Gastonia. The OP asked specifically about schools west of Charlotte I addressed those schools.
I think school rankings and test scores make it easy for "outsiders" to get a good idea of where the better schools are and it probably works. However, natives can probably identify good schools that don't necessarily rank high. Some schools wont rank well and natives will mostly agree that they're bad...this will usually be your schools in areas of higher poverty...which usually have high concentrations of African Americans (Southwest Middle is an example I can think of). I agree that Highland is a very, very good school. Oddly enough, Highland is located in one of the worst areas (drugs/prostitution, etc) of the Charlotte metro - it's a magnet school though so only the "brightest" students from around the county have a chance to enter the lottery to go there.
If you click on the link I posted in that thread about the methodology it takes you to this year's methodology (I can't actually find it just on the ranking site), which in relation to this discussion mentions that it takes into account the number of economically disadvantage students as well as how they perform compared to other similar students.
According to that, the best schools in the Charlotte metro are Butler, South Meck, Cox Mill, Porter Ridge, Mooresville, Central Cabarrus, Olympic, Hopewell, Independence, Kings Mountain, and Lincolnton. It's likely that schools like Marvin Ridge, Ardrey Kell, etc. don't have enough data on economically disadvantaged students that they weren't included.
A descent school is a school where there is a method for eliminating or controlling disruptive students and parents are involved in the school an their child's education. Along with that kind of school comes the better teachers. Bottom line, you will find better schools in areas where the education level is at its' highest and crime levels are at there lowest. It isn't the schools that are terrible, it is the people that go through the entrance doors daily that make it that way.
I agree. I do believe it's possible to find good (not the best) schools in areas where the locals on average aren't very educated. Take Kings Mtn as an example - only 14.4% of the population have a bachelors degree. That's nearly half the state average. For Lincolnton it's only 17%. But yes, these areas have relatively low crime and most of the parents are at least somewhat involved in their child's life.
Location: The place where the road & the sky collide
23,813 posts, read 34,657,307 times
Reputation: 10256
Quote:
Originally Posted by eddiehaskell
I agree. I do believe it's possible to find good (not the best) schools in areas where the locals on average aren't very educated. Take Kings Mtn as an example - only 14.4% of the population have a bachelors degree. That's nearly half the state average. For Lincolnton it's only 17%. But yes, these areas have relatively low crime and most of the parents are at least somewhat involved in their child's life.
Kings Mountain HS is fairly consistently ranked better than average on Great Schools. Part of their ranking is how many kids go from high school to college. Many kids in Kings Mountain work for a couple of years then go to college or trade school. This hurts the high school rating on Great Schools. The school is now trying to dig up grants & scholarships for kids.
If you really care, you can determine this for yourself on the NC DPI web site.
I would focus on how many passed algebra 1 and how many students (convert to %) are taking high level classes.
There is a lot of data out there. Parent rankings and the US News stuff is very subjective, I don't think you will go wrong looking at the math and how many in the high school are taking rigorous courses.
Pretty buildings have about 0 influence of the quality of education.
If you really care, you can determine this for yourself on the NC DPI web site.
I would focus on how many passed algebra 1 and how many students (convert to %) are taking high level classes.
There is a lot of data out there. Parent rankings and the US News stuff is very subjective, I don't think you will go wrong looking at the math and how many in the high school are taking rigorous courses.
Yes but as has been mentioned the "averages" will be better at schools where a higher percentage of the population comes from highly educated and higher income families. The US News rankings are based on "math" too.
No it doesn't. But that doesn't mean that the teachers are better.
Teachers are there to guide students and provide educational ops. Students that take responsibility for their learning will always prevail. Parents are instrumental to a huge extent.
In other words one cannot find a great school without parental involvement and value of education.
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