Thanks so much for asking a great question, giving me this opportunity
to comment on a subject near and dear to my heart. I am a retired
public school administrator and teacher, so please forgive the strong
tone in my comment.
Some private schools are better than public schools. Some public
schools are better than private schools. How do you know which is
better?
I'm sure there is no "answer" to your question. You will find sources
which give you test score performance comparisons in the district you
asked about, but they won't answer your question. Test scores do
evaluate student performance,but they are valid when comparing how a
student performed last year compared with how the same student
performed this year in the same subject. The quality of the school
might legitimately be evaluated from the proven ability of a school to
improve the performance of individual students, but those data are not
available because the information is private. A school's overall
student test scores more often are a result of the quality of the
students (and their family life) who are attending the school.
Comparing any two schools with each other, public or private, by using
overall student test scores is not valid, in my opinion.
Your best evaluation of any school will be to ask the parents of
students currently and formerly enrolled how satisfied they are with:
the quality of instruction, the content of the curriculum, the known
future successes or struggles of students who attended that school in
the past, and school discipline issues.
We have become student test score crazy in our society as we grasp for
ways to evaluate our schools. Evaluation is a great thing to do, but
it requires something other than test scores to accomplish, in my
humble opinion. |
