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Hi all, my family will be moving to the DFW area in about 6months. I have been doing some extensive searches regarding neighborhoods and schools. I am finding many negative feeds when it comes to areas which are diversified with a good number of blacks or a good number of hispanics. I'm trying to figure out if it is simply because they are black or hispanic or if it is for some other reason. I'm finding people making cracks about an area with apartment housing causes lower TAKS scores. I'm finding comments where people are saying school districts that have low income families also brings down TAKS scores. Maybe, i'm missing something but what does any of these demographics have to do with TAKS scores. DFW area has been promoting diversity in virtually everything I see yet, when i read these post I am not seeing the diversity. I'm reading negative post simply because of minority presence. My husband and I were in the area looking around in early Oct. and we went to a football game. Cedar Hill vs Desoto..we chose this game because we knew it would be a prodominately large minority crowd and we wanted to see for ourselves if we saw anything like what we've been reading. Granted, I know you can't judge by one event, but we saw nothing that alarmed us and the teenagers were as well behaved as any other teen regardless of race. We even engaged in conversations with adults sitting around us..we never said we were from out of town looking around we just started engaging in conversation - nothing unusual. I'm just curious if anyone else has gotten this impression from these post as well as anyone elses thoughts on this.
Hi all, my family will be moving to the DFW area in about 6months. I have been doing some extensive searches regarding neighborhoods and schools. I am finding many negative feeds when it comes to areas which are diversified with a good number of blacks or a good number of hispanics. I'm trying to figure out if it is simply because they are black or hispanic or if it is for some other reason. I'm finding people making cracks about an area with apartment housing causes lower TAKS scores. I'm finding comments where people are saying school districts that have low income families also brings down TAKS scores. Maybe, i'm missing something but what does any of these demographics have to do with TAKS scores. DFW area has been promoting diversity in virtually everything I see yet, when i read these post I am not seeing the diversity. I'm reading negative post simply because of minority presence. My husband and I were in the area looking around in early Oct. and we went to a football game. Cedar Hill vs Desoto..we chose this game because we knew it would be a prodominately large minority crowd and we wanted to see for ourselves if we saw anything like what we've been reading. Granted, I know you can't judge by one event, but we saw nothing that alarmed us and the teenagers were as well behaved as any other teen regardless of race. We even engaged in conversations with adults sitting around us..we never said we were from out of town looking around we just started engaging in conversation - nothing unusual. I'm just curious if anyone else has gotten this impression from these post as well as anyone elses thoughts on this.
First of all, welcome! DFW is a terrific area to live in and hopefully you will find your place here soon.
As to the minority negativity you seem to be sensing here, the opinions on the forum are just that - personal opinions; although I do think you might be misinterpreting some of them. I think one of the assumptions is that since apt dwellers tend to be more transient or ESL families. the children's academic performance is poorer and this reflects on the TAKS scores. The cracks are more at the TAKS system since few kids below average can drag a school off its exemplary rating.
Hi all, my family will be moving to the DFW area in about 6months. I have been doing some extensive searches regarding neighborhoods and schools. I am finding many negative feeds when it comes to areas which are diversified with a good number of blacks or a good number of hispanics. I'm trying to figure out if it is simply because they are black or hispanic or if it is for some other reason. I'm finding people making cracks about an area with apartment housing causes lower TAKS scores. I'm finding comments where people are saying school districts that have low income families also brings down TAKS scores. Maybe, i'm missing something but what does any of these demographics have to do with TAKS scores. DFW area has been promoting diversity in virtually everything I see yet, when i read these post I am not seeing the diversity. I'm reading negative post simply because of minority presence. My husband and I were in the area looking around in early Oct. and we went to a football game. Cedar Hill vs Desoto..we chose this game because we knew it would be a prodominately large minority crowd and we wanted to see for ourselves if we saw anything like what we've been reading. Granted, I know you can't judge by one event, but we saw nothing that alarmed us and the teenagers were as well behaved as any other teen regardless of race. We even engaged in conversations with adults sitting around us..we never said we were from out of town looking around we just started engaging in conversation - nothing unusual. I'm just curious if anyone else has gotten this impression from these post as well as anyone elses thoughts on this.
Cedar Hill and DeSoto are nice places to live; they seem to be more attractive to black families than to white families. I don't know why that would be. A friend of mine used to live in DeSoto and we'd hang out down there and go out to eat; often we'd be the only white people in a restaurant, but it didn't bother us and didn't seem to bother anybody around us.
Many of the posters here are being honest about the state of the DISD and the unacceptably low TAKS scores here. If you examine the DISD's performance in detail on the TEA's website, you will see that public schools in Dallas with high percentages of minority students do, in fact, do less well on standardized tests than schools without high percentages of minority students. The fact that blacks and Hispanics as a group do less well on state standardized tests is indisputable. However, I think it has more to do with socio-economic status than race. Middle-class blacks and Hispanics tend to do about as well as their white peers. Poor white children do far less well than their middle-class white peers.
I'm not trying to stereotype here; I'm just stating the facts as I see them. I think it's unacceptable that we have large groups of children not performing to their potential in our public schools. The city and the state are failing in their duty to educate those children. It's not so much that they're bringing down the TAKS scores...it's that the schools are letting those kids down. This needs to be a much bigger issue than it is presently. We as a nation can't afford to waste our childrens' potential.
Thank you moving 2008. When I go to my DISD school's events it's like Norman Rockwell has returned to Earth. Kids of all colors get along and actually enjoy each other's company. Some will go on to the Ivy League and some will drop out and mow your yard or fix your car.
To me, this is perfection - not all-white schools as far north as you can go...which seems to be the herd mentality.
I have to agree with NativeDallas on this one. Some people look at the test scores and (IMO) incorrectly correlate race with score ranges. From what I've seen, it seems to me more of a socio-economic thing (well, and an ESL thing). Race is irrelevant:
- The "poor" kids seem to test worse; middle class and above seem to test better. Not sure of the underlying cause, but I'd assume it may have to do with many poor families having both parents working odd hours to put food on the table and a roof over their head, but I'm totally assuming here.
- When English isn't your first language, testing may be more difficult (ie. if you read slower - you can't finish the tests in the time allotted).
I hope I'm being somewhat clear without being offensive... I certainly don't mean any.
Thanks for your response. Your post does make sense to me. I guess you have to look deeper into the issue and start in the home. I just wish it would be stated that way because again as you said, not all minorities fall in the poor achieving category even if they come from a family considered to be "less than upper middle class".
Thanks for your response. Your post does make sense to me. I guess you have to look deeper into the issue and start in the home. I just wish it would be stated that way because again as you said, not all minorities fall in the poor achieving category even if they come from a family considered to be "less than upper middle class".
If you're considering moving to DFW and you liked the areas you saw, go ahead and move here! Don't let other people make up your mind for you.
If you're curious about Cedar Hill and DeSoto's academic performance, you can look both of them up here:
I have to agree with NativeDallas on this one. Some people look at the test scores and (IMO) incorrectly correlate race with score ranges. From what I've seen, it seems to me more of a socio-economic thing (well, and an ESL thing). Race is irrelevant:
- The "poor" kids seem to test worse; middle class and above seem to test better. Not sure of the underlying cause, but I'd assume it may have to do with many poor families having both parents working odd hours to put food on the table and a roof over their head, but I'm totally assuming here.
- When English isn't your first language, testing may be more difficult (ie. if you read slower - you can't finish the tests in the time allotted).
I hope I'm being somewhat clear without being offensive... I certainly don't mean any.
Brian
No offense taken at all. Actually my husband and I were having the same talk because I was telling him when we are looking at the TAKS scores we have to look in between the lines. I think you are exactly right. When I looked at the demographics of many many DFW school districts, the ones that were mostly rated exemplary or recognized (for the most part) had a very low diversity mix and there was not many of the ESL students. Now I did show some top performing schools in Richardson ISD that had a good amount of minority diversification as well as a few schools in a few other districts but it was evident that the vast majority of schools rated exemplary simply didn't have a large diverse mix of kids and very small amount of ESL students. And I would agree with you, if English is not your first language, a standardized test will not be as easy for you..i can imagine simply understanding and interpreting what is being asked can be a challenge. I personally think if a school has caring Parents and caring teachers it can be an awesome school even if the TAKS score is rating it AA instead of E and R.
No offense taken at all. Actually my husband and I were having the same talk because I was telling him when we are looking at the TAKS scores we have to look in between the lines. I think you are exactly right. When I looked at the demographics of many many DFW school districts, the ones that were mostly rated exemplary or recognized (for the most part) had a very low diversity mix and there was not many of the ESL students. Now I did show some top performing schools in Richardson ISD that had a good amount of minority diversification as well as a few schools in a few other districts but it was evident that the vast majority of schools rated exemplary simply didn't have a large diverse mix of kids and very small amount of ESL students. And I would agree with you, if English is not your first language, a standardized test will not be as easy for you..i can imagine simply understanding and interpreting what is being asked can be a challenge. I personally think if a school has caring Parents and caring teachers it can be an awesome school even if the TAKS score is rating it AA instead of E and R.
You're right about Richardson...I think that district has an excellent balance of diversity and good schools. If we don't end up in the country, we'll probably buy a house there. I wouldn't want my future offspring going to a school that's 80-90% one ethnic group. They need the opportunity to meet, interact with, and befriend people from all sorts of different backgrounds. That will help them prepare to be successful in today's world.
There are a lot of dynamics and also the schools which are the most diverse have the larger chance of getting lower ratings as each group must pass. If one or more of the groups fail to make a certain percentage (or if some miss the test), the entire school's ranking is shot..
Sometimes in the socio-economic and racial mixture you will find certain peer groups who pressure others not to achieve because that would be too much like the reigning academic stars. Sometimes it is also because of the fear of failure...
I would hope that all groups and their members would achieve but even if they don't I find there is a lot of value in knowing them..
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