AJC investigation: Dropouts in Georgia far higher than reported. Can we fix it?
In a front page Sunday investigation, the AJC shares its discovery – learned through open records requests — that 30,751 students in the Class of 2011 left high school without a diploma, nearly double the 15,590 initially reported.
The jarring difference owes to new federal requirements for counting dropouts, requirements that now put the onus on systems to track students who disappear.
I wonder whether schools have the staff to do what one principal described as intense detective work to hunt missing students.
“It’s going to be something where we all turn into Sherlock Holmes,” and we’re tracking every lead we can. It basically is a guilty-until-proven-innocent format,” Gabe Crerie, principal at Henry County’s Eagle’s Landing High School, said. He and his school’s grad coaches spent seven hours one day this summer, trying to track down 62 suspected dropouts. They found 33 at other schools, Crerie said.
The AJC story by reporters Nancy Badertscher and Kelly Guckian notes that Cherokee County officials considered the old formula suspect 10 years ago, when the state first adopted it. Superintendent Frank Petruzielo issued an edict that school officials document students said to be transferring from the district and to review their dropout data twice a year. That vigilance paid off: Among metro districts, Cherokee had one of the smaller increases in dropouts — 90 — and its grad rate moved 7.3 percentage points, from 82.1 percent to 74.8 percent.
I have to point out the obvious here: Georgia has one of the nation’s lowest graduation rates in part because it has one of the nation’s highest child poverty rates. After decades of writing about schools, I am convinced that we can’t deal with one without addressing the other.
Poor children are not a lost cause, but keeping them in school and on grade level requires an unwavering commitment of time, energy and money, and I sometimes wonder whether we have the will in Georgia to make such a commitment.
Please note that Georgia has never done well with low-income students. There is no golden era of education over which to wax nostalgic. The state’s failure to graduate large numbers of high school students was not a problem a generation ago when mill and factory jobs awaited them. In fact, the promise of cheap, ready labor — along with cheap, ready land — was something that Georgia presented as a selling point to new industries.
Now, little awaits a high school dropout. Industry wants educated workers who are able to adapt and learn new skills quickly.
According to the main AJC story in the Sunday package:
The discrepancy came to light because this year the federal government made all states use a new, more rigorous method to calculate graduation rates. Under the new formula, the state’s graduation rate plunged from 80.9 percent to 67.4 percent, one of the nation’s lowest.
Part of the reason for the decline is that the new formula defines a graduate as someone who earns a diploma in four years, though thousands of students take five years or longer. But the AJC’s analysis shows — for the first time — how much of the discrepancy stemmed from a failure to accurately measure how many students drop out.
For years, inflated graduation rates helped state and local districts meet political pressures and claim success. But undercounting the number of dropouts did nothing for the kids who quit school unnoticed.
“They spent more time trying to fix the numbers, than they did trying to fix the problem,” said Cathy Henson, an advocate for education reform and former state Board of Education chair. “My frustration is that if you’re giving people phony data, then they don’t understand the magnitude, the urgency of the problem.”
The cost to the taxpayer can be high. Dropouts are more likely to spend time in prison and need public assistance at some time in their lives.
In Clayton County, parents were stunned when told local dropout numbers quadrupled under the new formula. “I’m just blown away by those figures,” said Melody Totten, parent of a Clayton County 10th grader and past president of the local PTA council. “The school board should hold the superintendent accountable, and the superintendent, in turn, should hold the schools, principals accountable.”
Education experts have long suspected that the state’s soaring graduation rate was artificially high, rooted in faulty data.
Under the state’s old formula, students who disappeared from a school’s rolls were often written off as transfers without evidence that they had landed in another school. In general, students were only counted as dropouts if they formally declared that they were quitting school, something researchers say they seldom do.
The new method takes the opposite tack, counting a student as a dropout unless the district can show that he or she enrolled elsewhere.
Former State School Superintendent Kathy Cox said some districts, under pressure to graduate more high schoolers, might have looked the other way when students left. “Some of this is catching people who were probably deliberately messing with the system, and some of this is catching what probably is just bad record-keeping,” Cox said.
Current schools chief John Barge is more circumspect. “I can’t say that a system was or wasn’t fudging the numbers,” Barge said in a recent interview. “Do I think there is large-scale people wanting to manipulate the system? I really don’t think so.”
Georgia officials announced in April that the state’s grad rate was 13.5 percent points lower under the new formula. They blamed the fall in part on the undercounting of dropouts but said they had no specifics.
In metro Atlanta, Clayton County Public Schools saw a huge swing, going from 392 dropouts to 1,584 and from an 80.2 percent to a 51.5 percent grad rate, according to the state’s data. Clayton officials had thought they were making headway. Their 2010 grad rate was 81.6 percent, better than the state’s 80.8 percent.
Clayton officials believe that at least some of the newly-reported dropouts could have been legitimate transfers, district spokesman Doug Hendrix said. But they also are taking a hard look at strategies to help students graduate. Those include counselors serving as mentors to every child and parent coordinators out in the community, Hendrix said. “It’s obvious to us there is some work to be done,” he said.
As early as 2009, the AJC reported that some districts were suspected of over-reporting transfers and under-reporting dropouts — two measures that boost graduation rates. In 2010 and 2011, the newspaper reported that thousands of Atlanta Public Schools high school students were taken off the rolls without documentation of where they went, at the same time the district was boasting huge jumps in its grad rate.
The new data shows APS’s dropouts increased from 798 6 to 1,544 and its grad rate went from 69.5 percent to 52 percent with the switch to the new formula. APS spokesman Keith Bromery said more accurate numbers put “us in a better position to know what the reality of the situation is for the district.” The district is creating an early-warning system that will alert teachers and administrations to signs that a student could be on the path to dropping out, Bromery said.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
Tell us what you think about the site
Customer Care »
Vacation stops, manage subscriptions and more
AJC Services
Sections
Other Editions
Visitor Agreement | Privacy Statement
© 2013 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
191 comments Add your comment
crankee-yankee
August 19th, 2012
4:33 pm
Perhaps a GED could count as a half a HS graduate? Think of the fun we could have with that!
Dr. K EdD
August 19th, 2012
4:36 pm
DR. MONICA…YOU SPEAKUM TRUTH…UNFORTUNATELY IT ALL FALLS ON DUMB EARS! (NOTICE I DIDN’T SAY DEAF!)
bootney farnsworth
August 19th, 2012
4:36 pm
@ monica
that is part and parcel of the choices students and their families make.
while GEDs are better than nothing, they are also often an indicator of how much or how little importance the recipients give education.
if they stupidly want to back themselves into a corner ….
I would love to see some kind of alternative where a better educational option can be had for those few who didn’t blow off their education but got caught up in bad circumstances
Its that new math
August 19th, 2012
4:38 pm
Its not the schools, guys/gals….its the NORMAL family unit breakdown. Most kids with a two parent home enviroment do reasonably well if they dont excel. We are asking teachers to do way more than their job description calls for. As long as getting a divorce, getting welfare, and not staying married are made an easy convenience, dont expect the populous to govern themselves. But thats what the Democrats want, if u can wipe ur own behind, u wont vote Democrat. Democrats need weak and helpless people wanting handouts to keep them in office…..its all part of their master plan for a pertual nanny state.
bootney farnsworth
August 19th, 2012
4:40 pm
I like using zip codes as the basis for establishing school districts. schools anchor communities.
I would strongly oppose another method (outside some charters) for public education.
that said, I would love to establish some better criteria for school board than residency and pulse.
some minimum length of time in community, kids in school in said community, and a minimum of Associates Degree or comparable professional experience.
bootney farnsworth
August 19th, 2012
4:41 pm
@ Ron
you also from Missouri on this matter?
talk is fine, but show me..?
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
4:45 pm
Dr. Henson: careful with the broad brush there. I know you guys in the charter system feel like the “red-headed stepchild” at the table here, but I hope you know by now that many here are not against you. Your program is serving an important role in a system that needs options like yours. While I agree that traditional high school isn’t working for many kids and that the dropout rate is far too high, it isn’t for lack of trying on the part of teachers. I honestly don’t believe there are as many overpaid babysitters as many think. The state and federal governments set policy, choose curricula, and decide what’s needed to graduate. We teachers are the ones trying to make it work, and we do so without much fanfare mind you. I truly believe you serve an important function in reaching out to kids who need something different, and I will be anxiously following the Bridgescape program, as those are the kinds of kids I love and deal with every day. If it works, I’ll cheer you on, and you can count on it.
That said, let’s try to be specific in our problem discussions. We could fire every teacher in the public school system and replace them, and things wouldn’t change much. The policies and mandates from our governmental leaders have put us where we are, and yet many more of us than you might think still care and are trying our darndest to work from within the system to improve it. It isn’t easy, and you might be surprised how many times I’ve considered jumping ship and going to a private or charter school. Do it right, and you just might see me at your door one day…especially if our state legislators keep up their despicable antics. I think the doubts and questions thrown at charter schools come from years of being browbeaten by our legislators who pander to us at election time and knife us in the back once the next legislative session begins. We don’t readily accept your work because ours is so denigrated in the public forum, no matter what good we do. We’re like the beaten dog who sees everyone, no matter how good, as a threat. It comes from years of watching funding go down while demands go up with no encouragement from anywhere to do the right thing. We’re as frustrated as you are, and yet even less empowered to do anything about it.
We need to be together in the movement to improve education. Our fearless leaders would love for us to be at each other’s throats, and I think have penned legislation that encourages just that. I also think they delight in us looking at each other negatively. I honestly think they don’t want us to ever find and work together on the common ground that is there. We’d see numbers go up, and then they’d actually have to pony up some money to continue the success. We’re both pawns in a sense in their game, in my opinion.
All that said, please be aware as you criticize that you can offend some of the very people you need to be helping you encourage innovation and change. Sometimes the best way to get to the “warden” is to work with the guards.
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
4:48 pm
@bootney: “talk is fine, but show me..?”
You betcha, and so far I’m not seeing them show anything but their arses. Can you believe Lindsey actually admitted, as if it were a good defensive point, that the state hasn’t fully funded QBE in 25 years?!! On the idiot scale of 1-10, that was 17 at least!!
Old Physics Teacher
August 19th, 2012
4:48 pm
This has been said over and over but you guys just don’t want to hear it. The more people graduate, the less value the degree becomes. Any sufficiently large population (a state’s population) follows the normal distribution curve. The mean, median, and mode all have the same value and approximately 68% of your population exists within one standard deviation of the mean. For every percent more than 60% of your population that succeeds at any performance, the worth of that performance drops.
For Georgia to succeed at NCLB and get 100% success, the high school degree would have to be totally worthless! Parents instinctively understand this and realize their children’s education is a shadow of what they received. That’s why the huge flight away from public schools is occurring!
You guys gotta stop this and let the schools educate and test and fail students who don’t want to learn or can’t learn the material. If you don’t, the nation is going to be filled with people with high school degrees and college degrees who believe scientific theories are the same things as opinions… Or worse, these people will believe politicians and media specialists know as much about science as scientists… oh wait… It’s already occurred!!
Representative Edward Lindsey
August 19th, 2012
4:49 pm
All:
I said I was gone but maybe not quite yet.
First off, Robert F.: You and I are focusing on two different things in terms of education budgeting. I am talking about macro in terms of the entire pot of education money and you are talking about micro in terms of particular areas of spending — which is very legitimate but takes this discussion away from Maureen’s original focus and I do not want to do that.
My numbers come from the House Budget Office, which is our equivalent of the CBO on the federal level. I’ll be happy to discuss them with you and get you information you want off line about particular areas of concern about the budget, if you will e mail me at the address I earlier posted. The same offer goes to others.
Farnsworth: I recognize that on the national, state, and local government levels trust is at a dangerous low in this country. I might also add that our citizens hold just about every other professional and business institution, including our education establishment, in very low regard. (I might also add Maureen that they don’t like the press either.) I believe that everyone on this discussion got into education in order to make a difference. You may not believe me but I got into law and then politics to do the same. It is going to be harder for each of us to show this to the people we serve for some time to come. That is simply the times we live in. But I am trying — why else would I be blogging with you on a Sunday afternoon?
Take care,
Edward
Ashley
August 19th, 2012
5:00 pm
Each generation is suppose to be more advanced than the one before……..my great-grandmother born in th1900 had little or no schooling, my grandmother born in the 1920’s had about an 8th grade education, my mother born in the late 1930’s and graduated high-school in 1955. I was born in 1958 and graduated high school in 1976 and college in 1979. I with to school when minorities were making geat strides when itcame to getting a college education, we were not rich and some were not even middle-class, but that did not stop us. I take offense everytime I read or hear a statement that says being poor is one of the main reason kids aren’t educated. I think that dead-horse has been beaten enough. We have people like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton always on the frontline when a perceived injustice is done in the black community, but where are their big mouths when minority children are skipping school and committing mayhem in their community, they have get out the vote rallies, but where are the stay in school rallies? Just one time I like to go to the mall and not see school-age kids hanging out before 4:00 in the afternoon, just one time I like to see teenagers take pride in their schoolbooks the way they admire their latest cell-phone or ipod. Education should mean progression and not regression, it starts when a baby says his or her first words and should never end. Doesn’t take a lot of money, just the will and commitment …..an open book that is been utilized knows no social or economic status.
Representative Edward Lindsey
August 19th, 2012
5:01 pm
Sorry for the typo, I meant Ron F. in my previous post — and thanks for the commentary on my intelligence. It is always good to be humbled every now and then. Have a good day.
Dr. Monica Henson
August 19th, 2012
5:05 pm
bootney farnsworth: It’s a seriously flawed assumption that most dropouts left school because they don’t value education. Really? One-third of the population of this country aged 16-18 just doesn’t give a dman? That gives way more credit than is deserved to what passes for valuable “education” that is served in dropout factories and is reasonably well-hidden in most high schools.
If the American public school system truly valued education, we’d make high school a place where students could and would do anything to stay and complete. That means a lot more flexibility, a lot more technology and relevance, a lot more excellent teachers, a lot more visionary administrators, and a lot less politics as usual by local boards of education.
Dr. Monica Henson
August 19th, 2012
5:06 pm
“damn.” Typing without my reading glasses is not good.
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
5:07 pm
Rep. Lindsey: I only push the point because everyone, in open conversation, needs to be aware of the realities. Regardless of how you look at it, the funding cuts have seriously impaired our ability to function. Whether you look at the macro or micro levels, the state has consistently, over the past ten years, reduced its contribution to education, period. Regardless of how you or I see it, I am on the front lines where class sizes are way up and teacher effectiveness is challenged. I’m out there where there isn’t enough money to buy books or technology the kids need. If we’re going to debate graduation rates, which is the topic of this thread, then we have to understand how the numbers you are dodging here, none too artfully, affect our ability to address that. We can’t get to the kids who are in danger of dropping out when there are 30 or more of them in front of us for 55 minutes a day. We can’t put in place the programs and personnel to counsel them and remediate them when we have to raise our student/teacher ratios. I prefer to discuss this here because I think it’s time for everyone- parents, teachers, and the general public to understand what we’re dealing with in our public schools. In systems that are still, through it all, working toward raising the graduation rate, we are stretched to the limit financially and have little left to cut. We’ve had to reduce our budget by 10% a year, and it doesn’t matter what your budget office tells you. I’m down here in the trenches telling you we dont’ have enough troops and you’re making us buy our own ammo, general, and all the while you’re back at HQ smoking a cigar and drinking coffee and discussing big win/loss numbers. Again, go out and spend some days in schools in your district. You will get a much better truthful image of what’s really going on and what your number crunchers downtown have no idea about in reality.
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
5:11 pm
Rep.Lindsey: I do appreciate the fact that you are here reading our posts. I’m giving you grief, but I hope you’re understanding the frustration we feel at constantly having to do more with less. It’s getting tiring talking about improving graduation rates when I can’t even get a toner cartridge for a printer or a ballpoint pen to write comments for my students’ essay rubrics or keep notes about what my struggling students need without digging in my change pocket to see if I have enough to buy a pen.
Representative Edward Lindsey
August 19th, 2012
5:21 pm
Ron: I do not smoke cigars. I don’t even drink coffee. I do, however, spend time talking to teachers, parents, and students in my district. If I had a magic wand and could get more money to you and every other teacher I would because I do realize more is needed — if it is spent wisely. I said that in my first post and I am repeating it here.
I am also realistic. I don’t have a magic wand and unlike the federal government I do not have a printing press. Your neighbors and my constituents do not want us raising taxes. Therefore, we have to try and improve our economy so more revenues can be generated so we can wisely spend more on education. Until we do, we need to spend what we have wisely and put forth those policies that can can help you in the classroom. I know you are on the front lines. I know that you are frustrated. That is why I am still here listening to you.
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
5:23 pm
Dr. Henson: I posted a reply to you that has apparently been lost- computer burp here, I suppose. If this ends up being a repeat, please ignore it.
I was a tad bit…well, okay, just plain snarky earlier. I have to ask though, that you be careful with your broad brush about public schools. I’m actually quite interested in what you are doing with Bridgescape, as it target the same kids I love and sweat over every day (if they had the money to fix the A/C, I might not sweat so much, but I digress). It is, to put it simply, the system created by politicians that has put us where we are. The mandates for school functions, including number of days, curricula, etc. are set by both the federal and state government. Their solution to “more rigor” was just “more” period. I know you understand the hard work that probably most of us in the system are doing to try to make it work regardless, as your subsequent posts show. Unless things change in the next few years, and if Bridgescape is successful, you just might find me at your door. I have some excellent bona fides, if you’ll pardon a tad of self-aggrandizement.
I think the legislature enjoys the enmity between our two philosophies. Divide and conquer seems to be the plan of late. What I’m realizing is that while we have different approaches, our goals are the same. I think if we can ever get past the distrust and sometimes outright ugliness, we could accomplish much more together. I honestly believe the state, in general, doesn’t want us to do that. The results could be phenomenal, and then they’d have to pony up the money they obviously want neither of us to have. Even as I criticize, I am watching and learning, and changing my opinion of what you do. Just extend us the olive branch and watch out for the knee-jerk reactions we’ll give when you criticize. My hope is that there is a way to understand the good on both sides. I’ll watch, and point out the flaws I see, but I promise to try to be fair in doing so in the future. My hope is that we don’t both end up continuing to be the pawns in the legislature’s endgame of privatizing public schools. I suspect Louisiana is one example of where we’re headed, and I don’t think that’s the way we need to go.
Representative Edward Lindsey
August 19th, 2012
5:24 pm
Ron: One more thing. If I haven’t said “thank you” for being a teacher I apologize. You clearly care deeply and you are the type of person that needs to be where you are. That goes for the rest of you as well.
Hillbilly D
August 19th, 2012
5:29 pm
Please note that Georgia has never done well with low-income students.
Never is a long time. Just curious as to where the starting point is?
sloboffthestreet
August 19th, 2012
5:31 pm
Jen Falk Posted,
August 19th, 2012
12:48 pm
Are you interested in grad rates by subgroups for your school under this new formula? Visit http://votejenfalk.com/district-iii-resource-center/
Now after visiting this site and viewing the data from our county high schools, the “Economically Disadvantaged” students outperformed their “Non Economically Disadvantaged” counterpart with an average higher graduation percentage of 3%.
So much for the poor kids being the problem.
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
5:40 pm
“I do, however, spend time talking to teachers, parents, and students in my district.”
I hope that’s true, Mr.Lindsey. I can’t say I’ve seen a representative of mine in 20+ years darken the door of my school. While you talk to these different groups, I would again urge you to go in and spend time in classrooms. You need to see teachers in action, not just talk to them here and in forums outside of school. I know there’s no magic wand, and I fully expected budget cuts when the economy tanked. I also don’t sense a lot of commitment from many in your ranks to restoring any of that funding when and if revenues improve. I realize we get the lion’s share of the state budget, and we need to learn to manage money better. I can’t speak for the metro systems, but a lot of us outside the metro loop have certainly learned how to do a lot for less.
Having read the posts here today, I think many have touched on administrative reforms I’d love to see you propose legislation to address in the coming session. I think the state has a right to set some rules for how its money is used and needs to perhaps set some more specific rules for administrative functions as a % of budget. However, unless you get back closer to 50% of local budget, you’ll have a tough time keeping systems from just using local money to keep the status quo intact. Could the legislature also set limits on superintendent salary/benefits to keep them in line with budgets locally? I don’t know if that is in your legal purview, but it might be worth considering. While I don’t think my superintendent is at all overpaid for how hard he works with a minimal county administration, I know many are in larger districts especially. I also think it would benefit all school, traditional public and charter, to be required by law to have systems in place for teachers to be stronger stakeholders in school functions. I’m not asking for a vote in expenditures or programs, just a defined system for us to have input and commentary before program or curricula items are decided so that we feel a little more like we’re part of the system, instead of just the trench soldiers I mentioned earlier. I think we need some way to take the top-down approach of running the state’s schools to more of a two-way flow of ideas and plans. If you make us feel more valued with something beyond platitudes, we’re a lot more eager to do our jobs and I think the results would show up in graduation numbers and test scores.
concerned teacher
August 19th, 2012
5:42 pm
If more money is being given to educate children, where is it? In my middle school we no longer have art, music, foreign language, computer classes, substitute teachers, professional learning for teachers, and much more. Every year we loose more teachers and increase class sizes. We work more hours a day and have numerous duties after school for which we are not paid. Show me how we can continue to educate children as they deserve to be educated when so many courses are being eliminated due to lack of funding?
Hillbilly D
August 19th, 2012
5:50 pm
If more money is being given to educate children, where is it?
I’m no expert but to the naked eye, looks to me like it goes for administrators and to build new buildings . There appears to be no shortage of money to build new buildings for the university system, at least not in North Georgia.
Pride and Joy
August 19th, 2012
6:05 pm
td asks the most important question of all ” agree with this statement and would like to know what you believe the ROOT cause of this child poverty is?”
The root cause of poverty is a lack of education.
An education is the surest way out of poverty. I experienced it myself. Poverty can be CURED in one generatoin or less through education.
Now why is it that many poor people do no want an education? Why would they rather wallow in pity and poverty and blame others for their fate?
Why does an entire culture value blaming the man more than lifting themselves out of poverty?
That’s what I don’t get.
Why is an education “acting white”? Who sold that line of BS? Who brainwashed them into thinking that educaiton is “acting white”? Martin Luther King was educated. He was selected to lead the civilo rights movement because he was educated.
Why does the black Atlanta community shun education? That is the real question. Getting an education is somewhat difficult for a few years. Living in poverty and being incarcerated for a lifetime is much more difficult. That’s what I can’t wrap my head around.
Education in the US is FREE for the poor.I mean 100 percent free for the poor. WHY don’t they get one? Life would be easier.
I can lead a thirsty horse to water and he will drink.
But, it seems, some human beings don’t have as much sense as a horse.
Bernie
August 19th, 2012
6:07 pm
Who is kidding, who here? Georgia and its citizens for the most part, has never been interested in the least among us. Never has or ever will.
These statistics and others have reflected that reality time and time again. We might as move along to the next topic of the day, for this one comes as no surprise, least of all to the many non caring citizens of Georgia.
We only become concerned and outraged when it involves the denial of the entitled ones among US! This is who….. We ARE! and what we have become!
The Price of our Failure, will continually to be seen daily during the evening and nightly News!
Conscious
August 19th, 2012
6:30 pm
Georgia’s problems under GOP leadership: a massive high school drop out rate, low literacy rates for those who do complete high school, few resources for health care for working class and poor people, high rates of obesity and high blood pressure and diabetes, increasing numbers of HIV/AIDS, the assault on the safety net of unemployment insurance for those who find themselves unemployed through no fault of their own, and the meanness towards immigrants will be national policy if the GOP wins the presidency. Bad news!
incredulous
August 19th, 2012
6:31 pm
@pride and joy, I think another question is how and why disaffected cultures lost their right to fail. It could be that an increasing number of people to “buy” into the industrial model that is applied as a way out of poverty. Constantly referring to race is overly simplistic.
incredulous
August 19th, 2012
6:33 pm
Sorry, I meant to type ” don’t ” buy into the industrial model that is applied.
Dr. Craig Spinks/ Georgians for Educational Excellence
August 19th, 2012
6:34 pm
John Barge’s call for truthfulness in educational data resonates even more powerfully with the release of these readjusted dropout figures.
Grad Coach
August 19th, 2012
6:47 pm
Wow! I don’t even know where to start. First, yes, I am a grad coach and have been for 7 years. I am very proud of the work I do. You shouldn’t lump all students into the same mold nor should you lump all Grad Coaches. I and the other coaches I know work very hard to help all students who need support. As for the comment about the seven hours, please know any work a coach does in the summer is off contract, we are paid the same as teachers. Second, a dropout isn’t just the individual who leaves school one day never to return, a dropout can be the person who has a family and needs to work so he/she gets a GED, or goes into youth challenge, or even the student who chooses to hold up a store at gun point is a dropout and counts against a school’s graduation rate; kind of ridiculous to hold anyone else responsible for that act, but being incarcerated counts as a dropout, as does a terminal illness, pregnancy and a multitude of other things. Or what about the student identified as a senior by the cohort method moves in midyear, or later, multiple credits behind with no possible way of graduating anywhere close to on time yet now counts against my school’s graduation rate; let’s just say the sending school is jumping for joy! I have also had custody battles where a child was removed from school or even taken out of the country and legally not required to provide the documentation I need to prove he/she is not a dropout. Third, once a child is enrolled in a school, that school has the sole responsibility of proving that when the student leaves they enroll in a new acceptably accredited institution, regardless of whether the move occurred after only attending 1 day or 1 month. In the case of such a short attendance span it never occurs to the parents to give this information. As an example, a 9th grader leaves in the 1st month of school and moves to a state that hasn’t started the new school year. The new school has no reason to request records, we know the student is in school somewhere but we have no documentation and often no valid contact info thus that student too counts against us.
I hope this doesn’t come off as a whine about not being able to do my job because that isn’t the case. I firmly believe that we can do a great deal, but we need to keep in mind that there are many things a school is held accountable for that is beyond our control.
Another Math Teacher
August 19th, 2012
6:48 pm
Old Physics Teacher : “This has been said over and over but you guys just don’t want to hear it. The more people graduate, the less value the degree becomes. ”
You are trying to convince the general public and politicians…I question your sanity. Next thing you know, you’ll be trying to use Math to convince them.
DD2
August 19th, 2012
6:57 pm
Rep. Lindsey,
For you to come on here and ask for suggestions of “how to untie the knot”, I believe that you are sincere in your efforts. I never blog are post on articles but I have felt the urge to share a few ideas I believe would start us (Georgia) in the right direction.
1. First and foremost I have been a classroom teacher for 20 years now. We must start with our profession and organizational pyramid. In the county in which I teach our school board is made up of 5 individuals, only one of which has any experience in education, and I believe only 2 of the 5 have a college degree. That would be like me being on a board that oversees surgeons at Piedmont Hospital. What does our board do? They take their job seriously and I believe they want to do what is right but the only vision or ideas they have is what is presented to them by the superintendent or principals. So let’s seriously look at a minimum requirement for school boards. Why not allow teachers to hold these positions in their own communities? We allow people from their own congressional or legislative districts to run for their respective offices. Classroom teachers would bring a much better vision to the table than people who have never been in the classroom.
2. In my classes every year I ask students about all the advances we have made since the 1950’s, after some great discussion of all the new technology that our world has witnessed in that time period in communications, transportation, manufacturing, and air and space travel, I ask about education. I have students to describe a classroom in the 1950’s and compare it to a classroom today. Basically the blackboard is now white, we use erasable markers instead of chalk, there is a computer on the teacher’s desk, and a few computer labs throughout the school. But basically we have not been very innovative with our educational system. No vision, because vision is not allowed under our current system.
3. We have teachers across the state that have no business in our classrooms, my students know which teachers in our school can’t teach, my colleagues know what teachers don’t do a good job, and I bet that is the same in schools across the state. If a teacher can keep up with all the paperwork they are now mandated to do, watch the waste of time videos from the state department of education on the new common core, keep their lesson plans updated, and show up to work on time…then they get another contract. I know teachers that purposefully do not give a student a failing grade so that they do not have to contact parent’s and deal with the paperwork required when a student is at risk. The documentation is ridiculous and a waste of time and discourages many teachers from actually holding their students to the minimum standard. Teacher evaluations could be done by fellow teachers from across the state that teach the same subjects. Teachers with the best AP and EOCT scores in their subject matter could evaluate a classroom teacher much better that a principal who has never taught the subject. Writing a lesson plan using the newest educational “speak” does not make a teacher effective.
4. LET TEACHERS TEACH. Do not have the state, county office, principals, and assistant principals dictate how and what a teacher does in their classroom. Let the teachers teach, the ones that know what they are doing and have a passion for their profession will not let their students down. Let their body of work be used to determine their effectiveness. But remember that our system is set up to fail in it’s present state. That leads me to #5
5. Our current “utopia” mindset that we can teach students of all learning abilities in a singular classroom in an 18 week course and get equal results is a disservice to ALL students. Our system of inclusion works for very few students and causes the more advance learners to suffer as time and attention is taken from them to help those that are struggling. In all aspects of life we separate people based on abilities. I understand the concept is honorable, however, we need to admit our mistake and move on. Our current system puts 60% of the resources into the lowest 20% of achievers, we are robbing the top 30% of our students because they cause no problems and have no deficiencies. We need to teach to the top.
6. So what do we do with the lowest 20% of learners that are at risk to drop out? We get hammered at the high school level with this all the time. But we must keep in mind that students that arrive at high school have already had 8 years of schooling. With that said MANY arrive with terrible reading and writing skills. They have been a part of a system that has made modifications for them since elementary school or early middle school, these modifications include extra time to complete assignments (sometimes even a week late), having tests read to them orally, computer software writing assistance, tests and quizzes modified so that they do not have to complete essay or short answer questions and all of their multiple choice questions are limited to two choices. This is a big knot. So what is the answer? Why do we have to be limited to the traditional school? If a student falls behind then we need to pull him/her aside at the time they start slipping. We should have alternative schools (not a negative insinuation here) within the same building that focus on reading, math and writing at the elementary schools. At the middle schools we need to really implement a move on when ready, some 8th graders are ready for high school classes, we should allow them to move on. For those students that are not ready they can continue with a curriculum and pace at their level. We can create a diploma track for those students that are behind when they reach the 9th grade AGE, they should be removed from our high school graduation rate data, because after all, shouldn’t we be judged on how we move students from freshman year to graduation when they enter our system at grade level reading, writing, and math skills?
7. We need to create an alternative diploma for students who at 9th grade AGE are reading and writing on 5th, 6th and 7th grade levels. I hate to be the bearer of bad news but these young people aren’t college level students. Educators have known this for years, we have talked about it for years, teachers know who these students are in their schools today. But we keep them in this system until they get so frustrated with failing classes that they DROP OUT. Then we (school) assume they transferred to another school. We know they didn’t, they are in the parking lot when school lets out, waiting on their friends who have not become so frustrated…yet.
In most instances, these young people have fallen through the cracks. The middle school doesn’t want 15 & 16 year olds in their schools. Middle schools are not designed for that, I understand, but high schools are not designed for 16, 17 and 18 year olds that read on the 6th grade level and can’t write an essay. Every teacher and administrator in my school has a college diploma. That is the case with all of our schools, you guys in the legislature, mostly have law degrees or at least a college diploma. So my question to you Rep. Lindsey is, why with all the college educated people in this area of educationo have we not figured anything out as of yet?
I will leave you with a perfect example of our failing system, a true story that took place just a few months ago. My son turned 15 and I took him to get his learners license. While he was filling out his paperwork for his test a former student of mine walked in with his mother. The mother and I had gone round and round the previous year about her son’s performance in my class. He did not pass, he was a special education student and mom wanted me to give him additional modifications and extra assignments to allow him to pass with a 70. It didn’t happen, I even told mom she was handcuffing here son already with the modifications she was having made for him. Nowhere in the”real world” would he receive such modifications. He had everything read aloud to him by another teacher. That day I assumed he was there to take his driving test since he was a year older than my son. My son was called back to take his test. A few minutes later this same young man was called and he entered the same room as my son to take his learners test also. Fifteen minutes later and my son walked out, excitingly said “I passed.” He came and sat next to me to wait for them to call him up for his picture. My former student walked out, mom said “did you pass?” He looked at her with the utter most look of disappointment and replied, “No, another 48.” She scolded him and said “what is wrong with you?” He replied, “I don’t understand a lot of the questions, why won’t they let you read it to me?”
That is a product of our education system in the 21st century.
An Observer
August 19th, 2012
7:10 pm
Bottom line after many years of data and trying is that we are not going to get everyone to graduate from high school unless we give diplomas away. The high school graduation rate is what it is for various reasons and will stay where it is. It is time to accept facts. The sun rises in the east and many students are not interested in a high school graduation. Kids are not made with cookie cutters and we should not try and cannot succeed at making them all alike.
Pride and Joy
August 19th, 2012
7:20 pm
An observer says we should just accept that some kids won’t graduate.
Observer, that may be true but why are all of them in Georgia? GA is rock bottom.
Do you really think that the physical land — the red clay in GA- has some sort of power to undereducate children?
If the stats were the same for all states, you might have a valid point but high school drop out rates are the lowest of the low in GA and always have been.
Why is that?
It surely cannot be explained by invisible lines on a map.
td
August 19th, 2012
7:21 pm
Representative Edward Lindsey, Maureen or Dr. Barge,
Do any of you have the numbers for graduates within 5 years and GED grads within 5 years? This would give the readers a truer reality of what is actually going on.
Ole Guy
August 19th, 2012
7:27 pm
Well said, DAWG. In “providing” these kids a justification for failure, we are, in both essence and in reality, guaranteeing failure. Such well-intentioned, yet extremely misinformed (and very stupid) tags remains “at risk”. Hells bells, from the moment we punch out of our mommas’ systems, we’re all “at risk”. Some…perhaps many…are fortunate to have parents who fully understand that their parental duty is to mitigate that “risk” factor. When it comes to having a “tough” time in school, there is simply no alternative from which to choose…”Son, you WILL not only pass, but pass with flying colors”…there simply is no other alternative.
These kids, though they may not enjoy the “positive influences” on the home front, have, through this “at risk” business, feel that they have justification for less-than optimal performance at school. By blaming it all on the “at risk” demeon, over which they have absolutely no control, they simply choose to resort to the path of least resistance…and the school systems, through their “poor kid, lets’ label him at risk” mentality, only strengthen the kid’s propensity to fail; to give up and blame it all on influences beyond his control. This very same mentality carries into adulthood; into a social mindset which says “because I’m officialy at risk, I can (and will) rely, perpetually, on uncle sugar’s largess.
If the gd parents won’t step up to the plate of parental responsibility, the schools can either practice what they preach…”we care”…and take control of the kid’s academic future or cut em’loose. The only thing these schools can do is demand…that’s DEMAND academic performance, not the watered-down version we’ve seen for far too long.
Hillbilly D
August 19th, 2012
7:33 pm
Do any of you have the numbers for graduates within 5 years and GED grads within 5 years? This would give the readers a truer reality of what is actually going on.
I’ve asked that question before and nobody has ever answered it, that I have seen.
I’ve also wondered what happens to a family who up and moves to another state, with kids in high school. How are they counted and how could you even keep up with that?
BehindEnemyLines
August 19th, 2012
8:07 pm
My thanks to “crankee-yankee ” for pointing out the failure of some posters to consider the man-hours used in the false calculation on the investigative anecdote. My one complaint with his/her post is that it didn’t come sooner, I had to sort through a lot of chaff to see if anyone other than me caught that
dropit
August 19th, 2012
8:11 pm
real dropout #s–much higher than is being reported. Ga is gaming the system again with phony reports to get federal money–book it.
Dr. Monica Henson
August 19th, 2012
8:15 pm
Hillbilly D, when a family moves to another state, the receiving school sends a transcript request to the most recent school attended. The transcript request is the documentation needed by the GA school to code the student as a transfer to another state. The same thing happens when a family moves to another district in-state, decides to homeschool, or transfers their child to private school. Transfers can be coded as such. Leaving to get a GED or just withdrawing with no request for a transcript from an accepting new school must be coded as a dropout.
Dr. Monica Henson
August 19th, 2012
8:18 pm
Ron F., no offense taken, and I’d be glad to talk to you as we grow. The broad brush I use to paint public high schools is with is borne of two decades of experience in district public schools in Georgia, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Florida, along with a hellacious load of research. I don’t believe that the system will ever be reformed from within–that’s one of the reasons why I’m leading PAGA. I believe that if we can demonstrate that reform is possible, on a large scale, replicating in our statewide charter district as closely as we can the conditions faced by brick-and-mortar traditional districts (mobility of students, special education, high numbers of Title I and other at-risk kids, and open enrollment to ALL, year-round), then the conversation will change, and change dramatically. That is our goal–to change the game.
Mikey D.
August 19th, 2012
8:32 pm
@Rep Lindsey,
Your willingness to listen is commendable.
First, you admit that trust of you and your colleagues is tenuous. That is true, probably of citizens all over the state. But certainly you cannot be ignorant of the reasons for educators’ mistrust, can you? After all, in an earlier post you admitted that you and your colleagues have broken Georgia law for 25 years by failing to fund QBE at the legally required level. On top of that, we are cramming 35-40 students in classes, and then demanding excellence from those teachers. If we are going to say that these conditions are out of anyone’s control, could we at least occupy reality and admit that these students-per-class levels make it nearly impossible to meet the expectations placed upon us?
Secondly, you claim to understand that available funds are limited but then engage in some pretty transparent political games by publicly chastising Superintendent Barge for pointing out the obvious, that we don’t have an extra pot of money laying around to create yet another state agency. Your actions here don’t really match your words, do they?
Finally, you’ve remained curiously silent while your legislative colleagues have turned teachers into the enemy. Given your leadership position, it would go a long way toward building your credibility if, on the first day of the next legislative session, you stood before the full House and publicly thanked the teachers of the state for their hard work and encouraged all of your fellow legislators to commit to improving the public education system. Yeah, that’d be nice, but I’ll not hold my breath, ok?
Another comment
August 19th, 2012
8:48 pm
Mr. Lindsay, I was recruited out of engineering grad school by a prominent member of the Piedmont Driving Club to work for his construction firm. That was 29 years ago they recruited outside of Georgia to find top engineers. When I worked with other engineers and architects who like myself had either grown up or been educated up north we always discussed the lack of vocational educational for the trades in Georgia. As the union construction jobs disappeared in Atlanta literally overnight, so did the training grounds for anyone trying to break into the trades. Then the biggest fiasco of all the Georgia one size fits all college prep track in high school. Ridiculous! !!!! That along with a crazy Ga constitution that limits the number school districts to 158? Or what ever the number was. Mega size districts just don’t work. We need districts to be no larger than 1-2 high schools with their feeder schools. The Supt. then get paid around $150k their are no layers of administration, the principals of each school is the next. School boards should be elected volunteer positions not paid. 2 to 3 school districts can share a votech school that juniors and seniors on a general diploma track can go to every afternoon. At the end they can have the equivalent of a 1 year tech diploma.
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
8:52 pm
“The broad brush I use to paint public high schools is with is borne of two decades of experience in district public schools in Georgia, North Carolina, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Florida, along with a hellacious load of research”
Dr. Henson: I too have twenty plus years, many of them where I am now in a room full of struggling high school students. I truly believe that while your efforts are earnest and needed, I also believe we must support those working within the system to do the best they can with what we have. Graduation numbers are like playing “pin the tail on the donkey” these days, and as was asked above, noone seems to calculate how many make it out in five years. Give us credit where credit is due, and you’ll likely see more cooperation from us. We’re working as hard as you are, just from a different angle. A tunnel is best built by working from both ends, and we truly need to help each other, not try to outdo each other. I commend your efforts, by the way.
Gasp! Clutch the pearls!
August 19th, 2012
8:53 pm
I seem to recall dire warnings back when Georgia’s Superintendent of Education proposed tracking school graduation rates and test scores for the purpose of school funding and teacher evaluations. At that time, Texas was caught fudging the dropout numbers by saying that a student had moved out of the district. Or holding students back a year in a particular class so that they wouldn’t be picked up on a standardized test as poorly performing. Once an investigation determined that the students that had “moved” were never enrolled in any other school, it became clear that most of the students who “moved” had actually dropped out.
How many other LOSER ideas can we import from Florida and Texas? Vouchers anyone?
Dr. Monica Henson
August 19th, 2012
9:00 pm
Ron F, I commend your efforts as well. It’s not that I don’t want to help those working within the system–believe me, I’ve tried to do that from within the system. I don’t want to “outdo” the system–I want to get the attention of the system so that the power brokers who make the system decisions will start looking at how to do things in the system differently. I believe that if it can be demonstrated that it’s possible to provide the neediest kids AND the brightest achievers with the same outstanding teachers, and both will flourish, then districts will want to know how it is done. It’s not enough to think outside the box–we are creating our own box, and everything we are doing is with an eye to how it could be replicated at scale in a traditional public school district. That’s the real promise of a charter school, and we are going to fulfill it. Every single teacher I’ve hired has, like me, worked for years in public school systems and become frustrated with the ineffectiveness and inefficiency of the bureaucracy.
JustMe
August 19th, 2012
10:22 pm
I wonder what percentage of dropouts failed all or most of the reading and math CRCTs from elementary school on?
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
10:22 pm
Dr. Spinks: You ever noticed that every time they “readjust” something, it’s always worse and “the sky is falling, the sky is falling!!” I’ve always heard you can torture numbers and they’ll say anything you want.
I’ve had a few fifth year seniors and a few beyond that to work with over the years, and even if they finish and earn a diploma, they’re still a dropout because they didn’t finish with their cohort. I don’t care if it takes until they’re twenty, if they can earn it and have it in their hands, they count to me!
Ron F.
August 19th, 2012
10:28 pm
“I want to get the attention of the system so that the power brokers who make the system decisions will start looking at how to do things in the system differently.”
Good luck with that, Dr. Henson!! I hope they’ll listen to you better than they listen to us. All we get is fingers in the years as they yell “LALALALALA”… You’ll have to hit them with the box to get their attention!