2013-2014 Dallas area SAT scores (Fort Worth, Arlington: best schools, college, moving)

[Walter Benjamin]

Dallas, Texas Area School Information: 2013-2014 SAT Scores for Dallas-Fort Worth Schools

Has the full list been posted already? I feel like this blogger must be a member of this board -- thanks for compiling it, whoever you are.

About the following list: I'm sure I missed some. I tried to check over several years to see if the rise/decline in scores was a multi-year trend. It seems that the majority of schools do not show a multi-year trend, but bounce up and down every year. Of those that show a trend, many more seem to be rising than falling, which is good.

It's a little hard to tell, however, because this blog has only reported the aggregate reading/math/writing for the past two years, and previously, only the aggregate reading/math scores. So it's hard to compare newer to older because of that. Is there a standard way to convert r/m/w to r/m without having the individual components? It seems like the r/m/w score is usually a little bit less than 1.5x the r/m score.


Scores rose from the previous year:
Allen
Anna
Arlington Heights (Fort Worth)
Central (Keller)
Colleyville Heritage
Denton
Flower Mound High
Forney
Grapevine High
Hebron
Keller
Lakeview Centennial (Garland)
Legacy (Mansfield)
Liberty (Frisco)
Lone Star (Frisco)
Mansfield High
Flower Mound Marcus
McKinney North
North Garland
North Hills (Uplift Charter)
Plano East
Plano Senior
Plano West
Prosper
Richardson High
Wakeland (Frisco)
Wylie

Scores declined from the previous year:
Grand Prairie
Greenville
Hillcrest
New Tech (Coppell)
Red Oak
Royse City
Ryan (Denton)
Sunnyvale

[Kosmonova]

I haven't seen this. This is a great post as so many on this forum are interested in (and argue constantly on) this. Thank you!

[synchronicity]

I see Plano West edged back ahead of Carroll this year, and Senior remained just under them. Big item I notice is that Flower Mound has moved up ahead of Coppell and just below Senior. Historically it was West, Senior, Carroll and Coppell all in a tight knot a bit behind HP, with FM usually a bit behind that group. Not any more.

Frisco schools are moving up, as is Hebron. They just may join Marcus/Plano East/Pearce and GCISD in the top dozen or so open enrollment publics. Lovejoys averages are also right there, other issues with the district notwithstanding. We'll see how that plays out over time.

In really general terms, the top open enrollment publics have historically been (groups are where the members jump around a bit but are generally in order from highest to lowest)

1) HP
2-5) West, Carroll, Senior, Coppell
6-9) FM, East, Marcus, Pearce
10-15) GCISD and various others (Keller HS, Allen HS, McKinney Boyd were usually in here with a few others cycling in and out).

You could also include Westlake in the same range as #'s 2 to 5, as it's a "charter" that is basically an open enrollment public for Westlake residents.

[EDS_]

Serious props to some of the suburban schools:
JJ Pearce 1635 (given its student population Pearce's scores are very impressive to me)
Coppell 1699
Flower Mound 1703
Plano Senior 1709
Southlake Carroll 1719
Plano West 1726
HP 1780



Regarding the Frisco thread from the other day the highest scoring Frisco HS (Liberty) logged in at 1626. A full 100 point gap behind PW and much more, what 154 pts., behind HP.

So far as DISD regular publics:
Woodrow Wilson 1346 is tops

I just spent a few looking at WW's scores in context. It appears WW is doing a better and better job growing what has been a very thin layer of top performing students into a slightly less thin layer of top students, but we are still talking about a few dozen kids not hundreds as with PW. WW's SAT participation rate has increased a bit over the last several years as well. WW still has a legions of kids who score below DISD's insane 990 college ready threshold (I looked up that 990 thing - apparently DISD believes 990 (M+VR) is the breakpoint above which most kids will not be forced to take remedial courses for admittance into DCCCD etc. Wow, talking about shooting for the moon - NOT!).

Somehow, someway WW needs to figure out ways to catalyze their improvements from a geologic pace, we'll be awesome in 75 years, to a disruptive pace, we'll be much better in 5 years, better still in 10 and you won't recognize the place in 15 - that kind of thing.

[synchronicity]

Originally Posted by EDS_

Serious props to some of the suburban schools:
JJ Pearce 1635 (given its student population Pearce's scores are very impressive to me)
Coppell 1699
Flower Mound 1703
Plano Senior 1709
Southlake Carroll 1719
Plano West 1726
HP 1780

Agree completely with Pearce, but don't forget Plano East. It often gets overlooked because we just assume Plano schools will knock it out of the park, but it has a less affluent student body and still puts up top 10 numbers.

I have a friend with kids in Keller HS and he likes it, so maybe I'm missing something, but that one strikes me as a serious underperformer given its SES. It's usually barely top 15 (this year two Frisco schools moved ahead of it to knock it out of the top 15), but has demographics akin to FMHS (5% ED).

[Walter Benjamin]

Frisco... looking at the list as a whole (including the charters and magnets), the Frisco schools rank 19, 20, 27, 32, 39, 48 on the list... that's pretty good! And the top two in Frisco in particular (Liberty and Centennial), do quite well, ranking ahead of McKinney, Allen, Prosper, Rockwall. Frisco is definitely one of the better public school districts in DFW - so why do Frisco boosters have to go and make unsupportable claims that attract criticism? Why not just be honest about where it ranks? When the brags aren't backed up by the numbers (as in the case of Frisco or Woodrow for that matter), it's not "hate" to point out that fact.

Edit: and to be clear, as synchronicity pointed out, the Frisco schools are moving up the list - that's good too. Good for them! But it's not "hate" to say they haven't reached the Plano level yet.

[synchronicity]

^^^Yes, that.

I don't think it's a stretch to say that, pound-for-pound, Plano is the best district in DFW. It puts up top-5 (West& Senior) to top 10 (East) scores with less affluent demographics than any district with similar scores (save for Pearce, but that's just one school in Richardson ISD. Richardson deserves major props, but it's not at Plano's level).

Saying a district "isn't as good as Plano" is hardly a damning indictment. Frisco's good and the last few years has been moving up. But no, it should not yet be considered one of the "Usual Suspects", although its best schools may be in another 5 years or less. Saying that is hardly bashing the district.

[TurtleCreek80]

Originally Posted by Walter Benjamin

Frisco... looking at the list as a whole (including the charters and magnets), the Frisco schools rank 19, 20, 27, 32, 39, 48 on the list... that's pretty good! And the top two in Frisco in particular (Liberty and Centennial), do quite well, ranking ahead of McKinney, Allen, Prosper, Rockwall. Frisco is definitely one of the better public school districts in DFW - so why do Frisco boosters have to go and make unsupportable claims that attract criticism? Why not just be honest about where it ranks? When the brags aren't backed up by the numbers (as in the case of Frisco or Woodrow for that matter), it's not "hate" to point out that fact.

Edit: and to be clear, as synchronicity pointed out, the Frisco schools are moving up the list - that's good too. Good for them! But it's not "hate" to say they haven't reached the Plano level yet.

The top 3 Frisco high schools are B+/A- schools when compared across the metroplex. The bottom 2 are solid C schools. It seems Frisco's schools almost need discussing the way we discuss Lewisville ISD - Flower Mound's two high schools are above Hebron and the balance of the district isn't worth a look.

Are Liberty and Centennial newer or older high schools in Frisco? They are the top 2 scores for the district; tracking with Colleyville Heritage and Hebron.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by synchronicity

Agree completely with Pearce, but don't forget Plano East. It often gets overlooked because we just assume Plano schools will knock it out of the park, but it has a less affluent student body and still puts up top 10 numbers.

I have a friend with kids in Keller HS and he likes it, so maybe I'm missing something, but that one strikes me as a serious underperformer given its SES. It's usually barely top 15 (this year two Frisco schools moved ahead of it to knock it out of the top 15), but has demographics akin to FMHS (5% ED).

I thought about prop-ing Plano East and should have. The school does a marvelous job every year.

I don't understand Keller at all either - that school should challenge for the top-5 every year and simply never does.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80

The top 3 Frisco high schools are B+/A- schools when compared across the metroplex. The bottom 2 are solid C schools. It seems Frisco's schools almost need discussing the way we discuss Lewisville ISD - Flower Mound's two high schools are above Hebron and the balance of the district isn't worth a look.

Are Liberty and Centennial newer or older high schools in Frisco? They are the top 2 scores for the district; tracking with Colleyville Heritage and Hebron.

Both are extremely new IIRC Centennial opened in maybe 2003 for 9 and 10 and later added 11 and 12. Liberty is even newer opening maybe 2006/7.