Greatschools.com has new scores --lots of changes--Druid Hills Middle up, Avondale Elementary up, Grady HS down (Atlanta: 2015, how much)

[jeoff]

Yeah, Greatshcools.com is not the beginning and the end of determining what makes a school good or bad. But, the site is out there, and folks are going to use it as a resource one way or another, and use it to help make decisions about where to live, or whether to use their local public school. They don't keep the old scores, but even with my crappy memory, I can still remember a few of them, so what I have noticed:

Druid Hills Middle: I am pretty sure that it was rated a "3" and now it is rated a "6".
Lakeside HS is way up to a "9" (I think it was around a "7" before), but its feeder Henderson Middle is rated a "5" (I know one family that did private for its middle school years, but went back to public for Lakeside, I wonder if this is common, and a cause for this huge difference).
Laurel Ridge Elementary, which feeds into Druid Hills is up to an 8, which puts it into the "green" scores of the GS system, and Fernbank Elementary is up to a "10" from an "8".
Avondale Elementary School is way up to a "5" (I think it was a "1" or a "2") before.

Grady High: was rated a "6" (I think), now it is rated a "4" (same as Jackson HS, Tucker HS, Clarkston HS, and lower than North Atlanta, Druid Hills HS, and others in the area). Its feeder, Inman Middle is still rated an "8", but I am not sure if it draws from exactly the same area as Grady (at one point, I heard that Centennial Place Elementary was going to be K-8, which would mean it does not feed into Inman, but would feed into Grady).

Not sure how much of this is rooted in performance, I think I recall Grady doing pretty decently in some recently published state ratings, so I am curious about the cause for the drop. I wonder if any of the folks that have seen changes in their schools ratings, have noticed any changes at their schools, or test score reports. Do you think that the changes in ratings are the result of something real, or just static, or just goofy ratings by Greatschools.com ?

[Newsboy]

Schooldigger is MUCH MUCH MUCH better than Great Schools. Their rankings are based on a wealth of data sets from multiple sources that are accurate and updated regularly as new stats are available. Unlike Great Schools, which emphasizes user ratings over information, Schooldigger compares ALL schools on an even playing field. Their user interface is also far better designed and easier to use.

I honestly don't know why so people rely on Great Schools -- unless they simply don't realize there are better alternatives. And no -- I do not work for Schooldigger or have any vested interest in their success. It's simply a far superior site for folks seeking this sort of information.

[jeoff]

Originally Posted by Newsboy

Schooldigger is MUCH MUCH MUCH better than Great Schools. Their rankings are based on a wealth of data sets from multiple sources that are accurate and updated regularly as new stats are available. Unlike Great Schools, which emphasizes user ratings over information, Schooldigger compares ALL schools on an even playing field. Their user interface is also far better designed and easier to use.



I honestly don't know why so people rely on Great Schools -- unless they simply don't realize there are better alternatives. And no -- I do not work for Schooldigger or have any vested interest in their success. It's simply a far superior site for folks seeking this sort of information.

After reading your criticism of Greatschools, I started digging around both sites, I agree that that School digger is the better site (though not exactly for the reasons you stated). Both sites try to do similar things, it just looks like Greatschools may do a lousy job of it--the short story, is that I found that at least some of their test data was incorrect--Grady's score for US history was recorded as 31% proficient, while the actual score was 67% proficient (which is in line with previous year) and Greatschools, also says that only 13 students took the test, but that number is really probably over 300.

Maybe the site is transitioning, and this will be corrected later, but Schooldigger has the correct data now, and its ratings of schools are more in line with what is expected. There are other errors--Not all data fields are shown for all schools, which could just be a website problem that does not effect the final rating, but considering the other errors, it may be all fouled up. Greatschools does include a variety of data to compile its rankings--metrics provided by the state regarding student progress and post-HS achievement, in addition to the regular test scores--maybe these metrics have value, maybe they don't--but everything is pretty worthless if you can't get the raw data right!

[sedimenjerry]

I got a little weary of greatschools when I saw Archer HS's rating drop from 8 to 7 to 5. All within one school year. I had subbed there before and I know nothing drastic changed. It's still a good, safe school where learning is encouraged. It's not a school where teachers don't care and neither does administration. Their academic standards aren't the best yet, but they're getting there. I do really like Greatschool's district boundary map. Very helpful.

[jeoff]

Originally Posted by sedimenjerry

I got a little weary of greatschools when I saw Archer HS's rating drop from 8 to 7 to 5. All within one school year. I had subbed there before and I know nothing drastic changed. It's still a good, safe school where learning is encouraged. It's not a school where teachers don't care and neither does administration. Their academic standards aren't the best yet, but they're getting there. I do really like Greatschool's district boundary map. Very helpful.

Same data errors with Archer HS--look at the test scores for American Lit and Integrated algebra 2---they are just wrong--and the the number of students listed as taking these tests are a tiny fraction of those taking the other tests (more than 11 kids took American Lit!).

If I have the time, I think I may start a great schools errors thread.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by jeoff

Same data errors with Archer HS--look at the test scores for American Lit and Integrated algebra 2---they are just wrong--and the the number of students listed as taking these tests are a tiny fraction of those taking the other tests (more than 11 kids took American Lit!).

If I have the time, I think I may start a great schools errors thread.

I don't know how they do their ratings, but there's nothing legitimate that would cause Druid Hills MS to jump from a 3 to a 6. I find it hard to believe anything would cause Avondale ES to go from a 1 to a 5.

If it is based on people's ratings, sounds like a campaign to raise the DH cluster's scores. Fernbank and Laurel Ridge are also in that cluster. Nothing has changed about Fernbank. Its a very good school, but its not any better than it was 2 or 3 years ago.

[jeoff]

Originally Posted by bu2

I don't know how they do their ratings, but there's nothing legitimate that would cause Druid Hills MS to jump sdszdsafrom a 3 to a 6. I find it hard to believe anything would cause Avondale ES to go from a 1 to a 5.

If it is based on people's ratings, sounds like a campaign to raise the DH cluster's scores. Fernbank and Laurel Ridge are also in that cluster. Nothing has changed about Fernbank. Its a very good school, but its not any better than it was 2 or 3 years ago.

It's not based off people's ratings. They have a formula, but they are putting bad test result data in the formula. I even see some bad data going into school digger as well--which makes me think that the bad data may have originated from the state--maybe results were published before all the data was in. The biggest clue for the highschools is when they report that 50 students took a test that probably 300 took. But, at least they show the data going into the high school rankings-they don't show any test data supporting Avondale ES or Druid Hills MS scores.--maybe they don't have test scores at all for those schools!

[PTC Dad]

I recently noticed changes to the great schools ratings. A lot of the top performing schools dropped dramatically. So if you dig into the data, you'll see Greatschools added a new metric which looks at student improvement. They are using this measure because Georgia public schools recently added it. So, if you look at the great schools sub data, you'll see many top schools rated as a 10 for test scores, but a 6 for improvement score because there's little room to grow in top performing schools. This in turn drops the overall score to an 8. Great schools ratings are now very inaccurate IMO. Schooldigger is much better.

[lastminutemom]

There is no reason, from a standardized test score perspective, for things to have changed. The state changed the tests for the 2014-2015 school years. Scores haven't been released and I am not sure they will even be released in the aggregate the first year.

All accountability measures for this past year were removed as well.

[residinghere2007]

I think too many people depend on these sites. The ratings are only based upon test scores so is no indication really of how "good" a school is IMO.

But I understand people don't know any other ways to see what a school has to offer, but really, as a parent, I wouldn't place much value on the ratings. Environment and teacher quality is so much more important than test scores and you cannot measure either of those on a website.