Newsweek School Rankings (Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester: 2011, school districts, college)

[Clifford63]

America's Top Public High Schools | Newsweek Best High Schools | Newsweek.com

Interesting ranking system that is getting some praise and some critisms. Not sure any ranking system tells the entire story. What is interesting about this one is that you see the usual suspects and some surprises.

"Public schools are ranked according to a ratio devised by Jay Mathews: the number of Advanced Placement, Intl. Baccalaureate and/or Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2008 divided by the number of graduating seniors. All of the schools on the list have an index of at least 1.000; they are in the top 6 percent of public schools measured this way."

[uptown_urbanist]

I agree with Clifford63 that rankings don't tell the whole story, and that rankings themselves are often rather superficial, but I still get a lot of pleasure out of seeing that of the top ten public high schools in Minnesota, three are located in Minneapolis. Goes to show that maybe those city schools aren't so bad, after all! And I'm of course glad to see my old school is #3 on the MN list (#232 in the country) - above schools located in the districts most often touted on this forum as the "best."

Honestly, though, I believe that all of these schools are going to offer their students a quality education, regardless of their location in an urban, suburban, or rural district.I love that in the Twin Cities there's not the pressure to either move to the suburbs or go private when your kid hits school age that you find in so many other cities.

[Slig]

Schools are one of those things that are impossible to fairly rank because alot of the areas that would determine if a school is better or worse than other schools are very subjective. Even though this list is based on essentially one criteria, the creator of the rankings has an interesting explanation for setting them up that way. I don't think they tell the whole story either, but I'd say this list is as good as any that are out there. It would be interesting to see how a combination rankings system of this report and the rating scores on the Great Schools website would turn out. Anyways, here are the schools from Minnesota that made the Newsweek's list of best American public high schools in 2009:

RANK SCHOOL
107 St. Louis Park
111 Edina
232 Southwest Minneapolis
498 St. Anthony Village
535 South Minneapolis
594 Eastview Apple Valley
635 Como Park St. Paul
645 Mahtomedi Mahtomedi
738 Patrick Henry Minneapolis
748 Minnetonka Minnetonka
829 Lakeville North Lakeville
839 Central St. Paul
922 Irondale New Brighton
949 Wayzata Plymouth
967 Century Rochester
1063 Eden Prairie Eden Prairie
1116 Simley Inver Grove Heights
1139 Moorhead Moorhead
1142 Hopkins Minnetonka
1199 North North St. Paul
1258 Stillwater Area
1279 South St. Paul
1290 Eagan
1298 Prior Lake
1331 Sibley West St. Paul
1421 Mounds View Arden Hills
1422 Robbinsdale Cooper New Hope
1506 Mankato West Mankato

[Camden Northsider]

Originally Posted by Slig

It would be interesting to see how a combination rankings system of this report and the rating scores on the Great Schools website would turn out.

Well- if it's any indicator that there is some credence to the Newsweek list- Henry High was named a top performing MN high school (there were 3-5 selected) by Great Schools/ Business Week, and similarly always makes (as do a number of other schools on this list) the US News & World Report lists for top high schools (and a handful, including Henry, were listed as some of the best IB schools in the nation)- US News and Great Schools seem to have more rigorous criteria for their rankings system.

[golfgal]

So, a school can make all of it's students take an AP test, they don't have to pass the test, just take the test, and they are ranked #1. That is what this "ranking" shows. For the Minneapolis schools they are comparing the number of kids that take the IB test compared to the number of kids in the IB program-not even the entire school, so this ranking is off about 40 kids out of 1000 or how ever many kids there are at Henry. As for the Business Week rankings, same thing, they are ranking the IB program, not the school. Check with the school to see how many kids are actually in the IB program, maybe the top 1% of the school?

[Clifford63]

Originally Posted by golfgal

So, a school can make all of it's students take an AP test, they don't have to pass the test, just take the test, and they are ranked #1. That is what this "ranking" shows. For the Minneapolis schools they are comparing the number of kids that take the IB test compared to the number of kids in the IB program-not even the entire school, so this ranking is off about 40 kids out of 1000 or how ever many kids there are at Henry. As for the Business Week rankings, same thing, they are ranking the IB program, not the school. Check with the school to see how many kids are actually in the IB program, maybe the top 1% of the school?

Actually they are dividing by graduating seniors. This would indicated that there are fair number of kids taking the tests listed. I don't believe the tests are required so I question if students can be forced to take the tests. They can be encouraged, but I think that is just what kids need these days -encouragement to participate at the highest level they are able to. I guess what I take away from this is that some urban schools are doing a good job trying to motivate participation in courses and test that are clearly meant for college prep. This does not tell the entire story, but it does show that kids that want to learn have choices and there are kids that want to learn in these schools. Hard to dismiss that as irrelevant.

[uptown_urbanist]

Originally Posted by golfgal

So, a school can make all of it's students take an AP test, they don't have to pass the test, just take the test, and they are ranked #1. That is what this "ranking" shows. For the Minneapolis schools they are comparing the number of kids that take the IB test compared to the number of kids in the IB program-not even the entire school, so this ranking is off about 40 kids out of 1000 or how ever many kids there are at Henry. As for the Business Week rankings, same thing, they are ranking the IB program, not the school. Check with the school to see how many kids are actually in the IB program, maybe the top 1% of the school?

No, that is incorrect. They compare number of students taking AP and IB tests to the number of graduating seniors - ALL graduating seniors.

Also, based on this and and some of your previous posts I believe you misunderstand the IB program - you have thrown around the "40 out of 1000" number before, but to clarify, this is NOT the number of students taking tests, or even the number of students in the IB program. It is the number of active (as in junior or senior) IB Diploma candidates. That is a very different thing than the number of kids in the program or the number of kids taking IB courses or tests - it requires taking a large number of tests, taking a special class (theory of knowledge), and writing a thesis-like essay. It's impossible to compare IB diploma candidates against anything in AP because AP does not offer a comparable program. There are many, many more students in the IB program (meaning that they take IB courses) who are not Diploma candidates. I think this is where your confusion is coming from, and why your numbers are wrong. Certainly the number of IB program participants is far higher than 1% of the school.

And I'd like to see some numbers to back it up if you're going to insinuate that kids in some schools are less likely to pass than those in other schools. I'm sure pass rates vary, but there's absolutely no evidence to suggest that kids in the city schools are any more or likely to fail them (whether IB or AP) than are the kids from the suburban schools.

[uptown_urbanist]

Originally Posted by Clifford63

Actually they are dividing by graduating seniors. This would indicated that there are fair number of kids taking the tests listed. I don't believe the tests are required so I question if students can be forced to take the tests. They can be encouraged, but I think that is just what kids need these days -encouragement to participate at the highest level they are able to. I guess what I take away from this is that some urban schools are doing a good job trying to motivate participation in courses and test that are clearly meant for college prep. This does not tell the entire story, but it does show that kids that want to learn have choices and there are kids that want to learn in these schools. Hard to dismiss that as irrelevant.

No, tests aren't required (imagine it's the case at all of these schools); in the Minneapolis Public Schools, the schools subsidize part of the costs of the tests and parents pay something too, if they can, and if they can't then there is a pool of money available to give everyone the shot at taking the test. And back when I graduated (about 12 years ago) there were also some kids who took the classes - and did well - who for whatever reason chose not to take the tests themselves.

[Slig]

Originally Posted by golfgal

So, a school can make all of it's students take an AP test, they don't have to pass the test, just take the test, and they are ranked #1. That is what this "ranking" shows. For the Minneapolis schools they are comparing the number of kids that take the IB test compared to the number of kids in the IB program-not even the entire school, so this ranking is off about 40 kids out of 1000 or how ever many kids there are at Henry. As for the Business Week rankings, same thing, they are ranking the IB program, not the school. Check with the school to see how many kids are actually in the IB program, maybe the top 1% of the school?

Golfgal, this FAQ of the ratings system should help you better understand the system that was used and the author's reasoning behind it. It is quite interesting:

Behind the Rankings: How We Build the List | Newsweek Best High Schools | Newsweek.com

[Clifford63]

Based on the rankings hovering around 2% for the schools on the list as calculated using graduating seniors, it sounds to me like about 4% of Junior and Seniors (total students, not just IB program) are taking the tests assuming that junior and senior class are about equal, and a decent graduation rate. That would be 40 per 1000 total students that take the tests. What is not clear is how many are taking courses but not taking the tests. This is measured the same for all schools, and it is significant that partcipation rate is pretty good in a number of urban schools.

This ranking is focused on top tier students without a doubt. I have no issues with that and find it releveant because what it is showing really is that top of the pile in some urban schools is about the same as top of the pile in some of the best suburban districts.

If I am thinking kids and schools, what I really want to know is will they have opportunity to thrive in education or not? Do the resouces they need to learn exist? By that I mean do they have good teachers, books and a learning environment whatnot. These are the things you don't have direct ability to control beyond moving. I value this a lot more than looking at average scores on standard tests because nobody aspires to be average.

Urban schools have more poverty and some other challenge for sure, but do these issues inhibit learning for all? This study suggests that it does not for top tier students. I am not exactly the brightest bulb on the tree, but I did work hard in school. I believe thoose that apply themselves will succeed more often than not.

I completely understand why many people focus on school districts and rankings. Cleary because they want kids to learn in the best environment possible. Who does not want the best for kids? Some have means to live where they believe schools are the best and are willing to do that. I find no fault in that, but I don't think it is a given that your kids will learn more, not get bullied etc. My opinion is most kids can do well just about anywhere, and a very important part of that is parent involvement.