NJ Education Report

Two weeks ago the big New Jersey education story was the CREDO report, which surveyed student outcomes in NJ’s charter schools and found that, while performance in most urban districts was mixed, the results in Newark were remarkable: for every year a Newark student is in a charter schools, she advances seven and a half months in reading and a full year in math compared to a student in a traditional Newark public school.

The CREDO report sparked much debate and some criticism, especially from those feel that Newark’s charters “cream off” kids who are less poor, female, and without special education or English language learning needs. (See Bruce Baker, for example.)

Now another big report made headlines this week: an analysis of the  Newark public school system, commissioned by the district and prepared by a Boston-based consulting company called Parthenon. (See NJ Spotlight and Star-Ledger for coverage.) Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson presented the report to some journalists (not me) and will now start making the rounds of community groups.
Here’s the presentation (called “School Performance in Newark”) and a couple of highlights:

• “When we look at performance, less than 50% of 3d graders and just over 60% of 8th graders are on grade level in language arts and literacy”

• “When we also consider college readiness, less than 30% of NPS students are on track when they complete 8th grade.”

• “Only 14% of Newark K-8 seats are high quality, and over 95% of them serve our relatively less needy…students.”

• “Our magnet schools disproportionately enroll the district’s higher performing and less needy students.”

• “Only 31% of our students graduated through the HSPA pathway and for Students with Disabilities the HSPA rate was only 4% in 2011. This looks more bleak when you consider that only 4% of students who enter high school “not proficient” graduate through the HSPA pathway.”

• “Controlling for incoming test scores, students in magnet schools outperform their peers in comprehensive high schools. However, only 40% of students in magnet schools and 9% in comprehensives meet college readiness benchmarks.”

• The absenteeism rate for Newark Public School High School students (non-magnet or charter) is 50%. [Absenteeism is the percentage of kids absent for 10% of the school year.]

• 31% of NPS 8th graders did not make the transition to a NPS high school.

• “Parents desperately want quality choices: nearly 80% of NPS 8th graders applied to magnet schools in 2012 (but only 27% attend magnets).”

From Spotlight, two of Superintendent Anderson’s comments:

• “Truth is truth,” Anderson said when asked about the data’s purpose. “We have to have a data-driven, frank discussion.”

• Anderson said most of the highest achieving schools were public charter schools not run by the district. “Without getting into all the nuances, the differences are undeniable,” she said of the gaps between district and charter schools.