Comments on: A Closer Look at West Hartford’s 2008 CAPT Results

By: mchrist

mchrist — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 20:57:03 +0000

60-65 is a D

By: Maggy W

Maggy W — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:30:21 +0000

We’re at the bottom or near the bottom of our DRG across ALL categories. For all those who who make the excuses- I’m tired of them. You can disect the numbers any way you want. You can blame our demographics. You can say we are different. Yep we’re different alright. We pay some of the highest taxes in the state and we get mediocre results.

We all know this is one measure. Let’s take it for that ,one measure and it’s not good. So let’s do something about it. Write, call or visit you BOE members and town council. Tell them that we need to stop the excuses and start taking concrete,understandable, IMMEDIATE, action to improving the overall education in this town.

By: Kevin Walsh

Kevin Walsh — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 12:26:48 +0000

The comparison to Amistad Academy is inappropriate to the extent that the student body at Amistad, while urban and poor, is also self- (or parent-) selected. While admission is by lottery, I understand that only about 600 (among the thousands eligible in New Haven) apply each year.

Comparing the test scores of a sub-group that is by definition highly motivated (if they weren’t, they wouldn’t be enrolled at Amistad in the first place) with those of an entire district does not add anything useful to the conversation.

By: Cynic

Cynic — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:17:06 +0000

Mastery Test reslts are out.
Looks like we were agian at the bottom of our DRG.
Don’t know the State ranking, last year we were 56 in the State.

The Administration took a year to develop their DIP, and totally ignored the current class of test takers. The DIP is only set to gather data in the next year, leads to much hope for the next year test results

The picture will not be pretty this year when the NCLB list comes out. Last year they were predicting both High Schools would be on it and if I recall 3 of the 5 Middle Schools

By: gk

gk — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 01:41:39 +0000

Interesting posts. I have three quick thoughts.

1) Whether or not you buy it, hasn’t it been fairly well established that these tests measure academic achievement as well as parents’ income, parents’ level of education, and first/second language acquisition? It seems pretty clear that if the WH population is different than other towns in these categories, our test results will be as well.

2) A test in which 90-100% of 765 kids scored excellent would be a pretty meaningless test. I bet if you tested 765 kids on their ability to ride a bike or blow bubbles with bubble gum you wouldn’t get those results.

3) The Amistad comparison seems like a total non-starter. I know nothing about Amistad and less about statistics, but there has to be a huge variation (or some other statistics word) between a sample size of 29 and a sample size of 765. Moreover, you could argue that Amistad is being inefficient: if they have perfected educating high school sophomores, why can they only do it to 29 kids? Why such a small-scale production?

The point is not that WH school can’t improve, spend less money etc., only, in line with the original post, that according to this one limited measure they have not declined dramatically over the last decade and are competitive with neighboring towns that one might reasonable expect to have higher scores.

peace out.

By: Roger W.

Roger W. — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 22:53:21 +0000

Well, it is obvious that we always do better than the statewide average, but I am not impressed with only 60-65% reaching goal.
If “goal” is a higher standard than “proficient” then we ought to have more kids reaching goal then just 60-65%. To me that is still a “C” letter grade. Proficiency numbers mean little in this case unless you are asserting that goal is just really way too difficult. Being proficient by definition means that you are expert and masterly, and that should be the goal. By adding this second layer of measurement, proficient and goal, that is just a cop-out so when the kids don’t meet “goal” (the highest standard) you can still say they were proficient. It’s real education mumbo-jumbo. Of course it probably is a mechanism so that in order to meet “goal” the school system can say they need umpteem million dollars more, when these kids are already proficient and have learned what they needed to learn.

My point about Amistad was that those are urban kids and the argument has been that minority and poor kids somehow are doing less well in West Hartford (and elsewhere) and they say that that is also a reason why we ought to be in a different DRG, and I don’t buy that at all especially when we are supposed to have such a great school system which offers all sorts of programs and interventions.

Bottomline is that I am not impressed with the scores here in trying to meet the highest standard. Yes, the kids did better than the state average and did well – but for what we are supposed to be doing here in our schools these scores should have been much higher in my opinion. I’d like to hear an explanation of why they aren’t achieving more.

By: whforums

whforums — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 21:57:26 +0000

Hi Roger — thanks for the kind words.

Keep in mind the 60-65% numbers are only for reaching “Goal,” which is the highest level of achievement on the test.

When you look at West Hartford students who reached “Proficiency” in 2008 (students who passed the test and are operating, as far as the state is concerned, at a 10th grade level), you get these numbers (our % first, followed by the state average %):

Math: 89% (In WH)/80% (State Average)
Science: 92%/81%
Reading: 91%/83%
Writing: 94%/88%

All West Hartford numbers are well above state average. In letter grade form, West Hartford’s “Proficiency” percentage ranges from “B+” to “A”.

And you’re right about Amistad — their numbers are great, with 100% of their students at proficiency in writing. One big difference though — WHPS tested 765 students, while Amistad tested 29.

By: Roger W.

Roger W. — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 17:33:36 +0000

A 60%-65% is a “C” grade isn’t it?
For all the money that we spend on education and for all the boasting about how great our schools are, one would think that we would be scoring much much higher on these standardized tests. I am not buying into the “we have minorities and urban issues” sound byte. Tell me how the grades from Amistad Academy – an urban charter school – did better than our numbers except in one category in 2008 (They blew us away in writing)

Nice job on this blog by the way – I am enjoying your posts.