[quote=temeculaguy]…I did notice that the elem my kids went to was in the 900’s, the middle school in the high 8’s and the high school, mid 8’s. I ran some of the SD coveted districts, similar decline as the kids get older. I guess that is just further evidence that we get dumber as we age, I’m sure the trend continues after school, which explains a lot about my current mental state.[/quote]
TG, it is true the (Math, English and History – in HS) teachers teach and drill to these tests. The 10th graders’ scores virtually carry the school. The CACI’s in HS are infinitely harder than the “STAR” tests in Middle school and Elem school and require critical thinking skills. I don’t place too much importance on scores below the HS level. These schools are simply preparing students for the “real thing,” that is, 10 and 11th grade, where their GPA’s are computed for college admission purposes. Although my kids DID attend an elem school scoring in the 9’s (not sure API score was actually computed during the ENTIRE era of their attendances), the reality is that HS GPA (mainly 10th/11th grade) is the only thing that “counts” in life.
Therefore, if a family purchases into a particular elem school attendance area (with its possible incipient high HOA/MR) solely for an elem school API score, your kid will be out of the school in seven years and the colleges they apply to will never see their GPA’s for Grades K-9. IMO, therefore, a 900+ elem school API score is simply “fluff,” bells and whistles and icing on the cake (in comparison to an 800+ API elem school). In the context of a “public” school, what is a 900+ scoring elem school really WORTH to a family …. monetarily??
It is far easier for elem age students (4th graders??) to score higher on these tests used to compute their schools API than it is for students at the HS level. They have less homework, less competing interests and the material they are drilled on for these tests is much easier to learn.
When you’re a lowly 7th grader beginning middle school, you have to start all over again.
In addition, I agree with other posters who stated Asian (Chinese?) “Tiger” parents commonly place their children (even when very young) in private tutoring and scholastic enrichment programs (which are cost-prohibitive to many, many parents). As stated before in this thread, if you look at the ethnic breakdowns of the scores within a school, a school’s API score is propped up by the “Asian” (non-Filipino) group.
Question: If your child is any other ethnicity than “Asian,” how do most of these “top-scoring schools” actually serve your child best? And why are the Hispanic scores so low in these schools? Could it be that there are not enough Hispanic and/or bilingual teachers who are sensitive to this culture? In some HS’s scoring overall below 800, the Hispanic group does much better. This can only be explained by these schools having many bilingual teachers who can identify with this culture and bring their best work out. In SUHSD (“Sweetwater”), we are very fortunate to have many longtime teachers who grew up in the area and came back to work here after college to give back to their own communities.
