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I think the hesitation is that not all children who apply get into those schools, and since you have to live in DISD, there is a risk that your child may not get in, and then you'd be stuck with them having to attend the no-good school in your neighborhood.
I do find it somewhat funny that Woodrow Wilson is SO far down on the list. Lakewooder is always hyping it to be as good as Plano West, but the SAT scores show it really is not.
I will say I am happy to see that both Grapevine and Colleyville Heritage are high on the list.
Woodrow Anglos average 1599 (533 per section), while West Anglos average 1715 (572 per section). That's a difference of 39 points per section, or roughly one question.
This is aside from the fact that the SAT doesn't really measure what one has learned in high school, but rather measures a combination of 1. how intelligent is the individual, and 2. how well has the individual been prepared to take the SAT. It's also reflective that this may as well be a ranking of "how wealthy is your student body."
It's also reflective that this may as well be a ranking of "how wealthy is your student body."
Not according to the Dallas Magnets that are nowhere near the same level as HPISD wealth but score above....It is encouraging to see how much Lakewood residents support and make excuses for WW, but NMFS, SAT, college acceptance rates, school ratings, etc. etc. etc. speak otherwise. COULD it get to the level of the elite publics, sure, it's just nowhere near that level yet.
I honestly hope it does get to that level as it will push the others even harder.
Woodrow Anglos average 1599 (533 per section), while West Anglos average 1715 (572 per section). That's a difference of 39 points per section, or roughly one question.
This is aside from the fact that the SAT doesn't really measure what one has learned in high school, but rather measures a combination of 1. how intelligent is the individual, and 2. how well has the individual been prepared to take the SAT. It's also reflective that this may as well be a ranking of "how wealthy is your student body."
Whenever WW has bad scores (see NMSF list) a WW supporter always goes racial on us. Almost saying "we do a poor job of educating _____ races, but the white people do well."
Woodrow Anglos average 1599 (533 per section), while West Anglos average 1715 (572 per section). That's a difference of 39 points per section, or roughly one question.
This is aside from the fact that the SAT doesn't really measure what one has learned in high school, but rather measures a combination of 1. how intelligent is the individual, and 2. how well has the individual been prepared to take the SAT. It's also reflective that this may as well be a ranking of "how wealthy is your student body."
It may not seem so but I really enjoy your posts.
1. I think as a society we need to back off the "wealth" excuse and ratchet up expectations for all students.
2. I disagree somewhat about your assessment of SAT scores. By default it certainly does measure intelligence nicely - it's a valid proxy for many IQ tests as an example. And I do agree that SAT/ACT test prep does spoil the waters a bit so to speak. However, I also believe the SAT/ACT do measure what kids have learned. Back to my son for a moment - he excelled in math/physics in HS. With almost zero test prep his math scores were SAT - 800 and ACT - 36. Although I don't remember his scores he also hammered the SAT math subject tests. That's a very long way of saying that the high stakes tests reflected his command of math that we had seen through high school.
3. Assuming your one question per section proposition above is correct - and I believe it is - across large numbers of kids one question per section is very significant.
Regarding WW and related schools even though they are likely the best in DISD I would not send my kids there.
Whenever WW has bad scores (see NMSF list) a WW supporter always goes racial on us. Almost saying "we do a poor job of educating _____ races, but the white people do well."
Much of what is posted about WW is simply boosterism without any or little context for WW's problems. WW is a neighborhood comprehensive high school that is struggling under the weight of student poverty, student readiness and motivation problems, and a terrible DISD central administration.
WW is having a modest upswing in attracting more middle/upper class whites and hispanics, but its ability to get the majority of its kids ready for college is not good. Its test scores for white students would put it right at the 50th percentile nationally for all white test takers. WW is an average school for them, but at the price of the better (often white) students being segregated into the AP/IB track to avoid being with struggling students. When I see the students in WW's great plays or the wonderful choir, both are much whiter than the school itself.
WW doesn't attract a core of top Dallas students. There are no recent NMSF. Most of the kids in Woodrow's AP or IB classes (say WW's top 20% of students and a high percentage of their white students) would not qualify to be in the honors classes at Ursuline or Jesuit (their top students.). Their SAT scores do not indicate that. Parents of top students understand this and usually chose to send their kids elsewhere (either to TAG, SEM, privates or by living in a different school district.)
Dallas needs WW to succeed and I really like what they are trying to do, but it would not be my first or second choice if I had kids. I have a huge soft spot for WW and boosterism has its place, but equating WW to most of the local privates or the top local publics is wrong.
Last edited by LakeDad; 12-29-2013 at 10:00 AM..
Reason: word choice
Much of what is posted about WW is simply boosterism without any or little context for WW's problems. WW is a neighborhood comprehensive high school that is struggling under the weight of student poverty, student readiness and motivation problems, and a terrible DISD central administration.
WW is having a modest upswing in attracting more middle/upper class whites and hispanics, but its ability to get the majority of its kids ready for college is not good. Its test scores for white students would put it right at the 50th percentile nationally for all white test takers. WW is an average school for them, but at the price of the better (often white) students being segregated into the AP/IB track to avoid being with struggling students. When I see the students in WW's great plays or the wonderful choir, both are much whiter than the school itself.
WW doesn't attract a core of top Dallas students. There are no recent NMSF. Most of the kids in Woodrow's AP or IB classes (say WW's top 20% of students and a high percentage of their white students) would not qualify to be in the honors classes at Ursuline or Jesuit (their top students.). Their SAT scores do not indicate that. Parents of top students understand this and usually chose to send their kids elsewhere (either to TAG, SEM, privates or by living in a different school district.)
Dallas needs WW to succeed and I really like what they are trying to do, but it would not be my first or second choice if I had kids. I have a huge soft spot for WW and boosterism has its place, but equating WW to most of the local privates or the top local publics is wrong.
Someone help me with specifics; I was told that Plano, maybe 25 years ago, beginning with one 1st or maybe 3rd grade class, significantly increased expectations for that group and all behind it. Does anyone know more about this?
My thinking is that maybe the Lakewood area schools and others might try the same.
This should be no surprise to anyone - futurists have been talking about this since I was a little kid in the '60s - we are evolving into an educationally segregated society.
Someone help me with specifics; I was told that Plano, maybe 25 years ago, beginning with one 1st or maybe 3rd grade class, significantly increased expectations for that group and all behind it. Does anyone know more about this?
My thinking is that maybe the Lakewood area schools and others might try the same.
This should be no surprise to anyone - futurists have been talking about this since I was a little kid in the '60s - we are evolving into an educationally segregated society.
People bashing Woodrow tend to either ignore or minimize the effects of the elephant in the room: having 80% of its student body be reduced lunch/ESL crowd. I'll bet a paycheck that if you transformed the demographics of the Planos, Highland Park high schools into Woodrows you would see the same type of results. From what I've learned from this forum and others outside, Plano ISD does a poor job dealing with its non academic superstars NOW...and Plano does not have anywhere near the demographic challenges Woodrow has. You can have all the "increased expectations" you want, but if Woodrow student is returning home to a non existent father, mother on welfare with 3 other kids, guess what? he/she is more than likely not going to excel in school.
The only way to accurately gauge if Woodrow is any good is to give it the same demographics as a Plano/Southlake. This is why we can bash Frisco/Allen/McKinney. They do have similar demographics to Plano and yet fall far short of what Plano has been able to accomplish.
Whenever WW has bad scores (see NMSF list) a WW supporter always goes racial on us. Almost saying "we do a poor job of educating _____ races, but the white people do well."
You hit the nail on the head with this observation. I've noticed the same thing. I think if people want to send their kids there, that's great. However, I don't think it changes the fact that there's no reason for people who have better options available to send their kids there.
The boosters seem to name drop a select group of students who are not representative of the WW student body as a whole as a way to legitimize their pro-WW arguments, as if that's magically going to entice other affluent families to send their kids there over a competitive private. That's just never going to happen, and some of the handful of "affluent" white students are actually there because they couldn't fit in socially at a private school or HPISD or need to go to a school where it's easier to rank high enough to gain auto-admission to UT Austin.
But I guess anyone who doesn't think it's an academic powerhouse or points out negatives about the school is racist...
People bashing Woodrow tend to either ignore or minimize the effects of the elephant in the room: having 80% of its student body be reduced lunch/ESL crowd. I'll bet a paycheck that if you transformed the demographics of the Planos, Highland Park high schools into Woodrows you would see the same type of results. From what I've learned from this forum and others outside, Plano ISD does a poor job dealing with its non academic superstars NOW...and Plano does not have anywhere near the demographic challenges Woodrow has. You can have all the "increased expectations" you want, but if Woodrow student is returning home to a non existent father, mother on welfare with 3 other kids, guess what? he/she is more than likely not going to excel in school.
The only way to accurately gauge if Woodrow is any good is to give it the same demographics as a Plano/Southlake. This is why we can bash Frisco/Allen/McKinney. They do have similar demographics to Plano and yet fall far short of what Plano has been able to accomplish.
No one is minimizing that challenges that face WW. What is tiresome is that when objective criteria is posted, ie, that WW did very poorly on an objective test (the SAT this time), a person will post that WW did good when you consider its white population, its free lunch stats, or the ESL numbers. Well, you have to consider all of those factors when you are evaluating a school as a whole. You don't get to pick and choose certain groups of students when evaluating a school.
As for your demographics argument, I think we all agree. If we dropped the freshman class of St. Marks into WW, with their excellent education background, their goals, the expectation of success, and their parents, WW would have 10-15 NMSF in 4 years. But, that is never going to happen. Instead, you have to play the hand that was dealt.
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