Read his first piece here.
Read Brooks' second article here.
Interesting stuff.
I passed both columns along to a group of my friends. Among the responses that I received is this one from one of my partners at CitySquare, Rev. Gerald Britt:
Brook’s
column gets at something I’m trying to put some language around. You might
remember an editorial in The Dallas Morning News that suggested that out of 3000 kids in 10 selected
zip codes, only 26 graduated college ready. I asked a friend of mine, a former
school teacher to help me with some research on these stats and she showed
figures that revealed that in those same 10 zip codes, nearly 500 kids
successfully completed their first year of college.
But
she also said some other things in her reply that supports what Brooks said, “Traditional
college readiness indicators for low income, minority, and ESL students do not
measure motivation, persistence, and the ability of students to increase their
ability to do college work over time. Research has shown for decades that SAT
scores are not accurate indicators of college readiness for low income kids.”
“The college readiness standards used by the state are overkill.
Admittedly, these high schools have a long way to go in recruiting teacher
talent and programming, but the data used by StudentsFirst does not trace the
successful kids in magnets and early colleges back to these zip codes.”
We
here more and more about solutions to problems in education being
‘data-driven’, but, as Brooks points out – data is a tool and we’ve got to be
attuned to more indicators than simply outputs and outcomes.
Thoughts?
Strangely, perhaps, I think statistics and anger have something in common. As a song says: "anger can be power if you know that you can use it." But if your anger is controlling you instead of you controlling it, you're sunk.
ReplyDeleteSimilarly, if you are using your statistics, that's great. But if your statistics wind up calling the shots, its all downhill from there.
Ken
Dallas
Mr. Brooks and Rev. Britt make insightful points, and StudentsFirst has a viable and necessary cause to support. The unfortunate reality is this: the bigger the population, the more likely a decision maker is going to manage to the bell curve.
ReplyDeleteWhat's needed to look 'outside the bell curve' is consideration for the intangible assets that Rev. Britt and StudentsFrist support: resiliency, motivation and 'sticktuitiveness.' What's needed is for decision makers and their staff to build relationships with individuals, not with zip codes.