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Tag Archives: Nevada Schools

Nevada School District is Missing Children

17 Tuesday Apr 2018

Posted by Paul Kiser in About Reno, Aging, All Rights Reserved, Conservatives, Economy, Education, Generational, Government, Higher Education, jobs, labor, Life, Nevada, parenting, Politicians, Politics, Pride, Public Image, Public Relations, Reno, Taxes, The Tipping Point, United States, Women

≈ 4 Comments

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charter schools, Nevada Schools, overcrowding, population, population growth, private schools, public charter schools, public schools, religious schools, taxes, Washoe County, Washoe County School District

Nevada’s Washoe County School District is missing children. About 6,500, and no one seems to have noticed. In the last decade (2008 to 2017,) the student population in Washoe County Schools has increased by 291 students. That is a half of one percent increase (0.05%) in ten years. The population of Washoe County has increased by almost eleven percent (10.7%) during the same time period. If the student population grew at the same rate the school district would have 6,500 more students than it does. Where are the missing children?

GRAPH 1.0 – WCSD Growth vs Washoe County Population (1,000’s of people)

Mystery of the Missing Students

The population of Washoe County increased by over 44,000 people from 2008 to 2017. One might expect that the Washoe County schools would have increased by more than 291 students. If the student population had kept pace with the Washoe County population growth, there should be over 70,000 pupils instead of just under 64,000.

Table 1.0 – WCSD student population growth compared to projected growth (Based on Washoe County population. NOTE:  All figures are from WCSD reports.)

Some of the missing students can be found in private schools and public charter schools. Private schools in Washoe County enrolled 3,419 students in 2016-17; however, total enrollment in private schools in Nevada have not changed significantly during the last ten years. Public charter schools account for some of the missing students, but they only enrolled 2,753 students in Washoe County during the 2016-17 year.

Assuming that public charter schools absorbed 1,000 new students during the last ten years, and private schools absorbed 500, there is still approximately 5,000 missing students. It is possible that the growth in Washoe County was primarily adults without children. If that is the case, it may indicate that families aren’t moving to Nevada.

Flat Student Growth Saved Schools

There is a silver lining to the flat growth in Washoe County schools. Prior to 2008, the district was overcrowded and facing a crisis. The flat growth allowed time to ease some of the overcrowding and end some of the desperate measures to handle the situation.

However, Nevada may be facing a bigger crisis. If families are choosing not to move to the State it may be that Nevada’s poor school rankings have finally sealed its fate. No one wants to raise a family in a State that has underfunded schools.

Standardized Testing is Not the Solution in American Education

09 Saturday Mar 2013

Posted by Paul Kiser in College, Education, Ethics, Government, Higher Education, Opinion, parenting, Politics, Universities

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Nevada, Nevada Schools, No Child Left Behind, NSHE, Pay for Performance, Reno, schools, standardized tests, student performance, teachers, Washoe County School District, WCSD

Most of the political discussions about America’s failing education system do two things. First, they blame someone, usually the teachers, and second, they seek simple-minded solutions that assume all children are developmentally equal and live in the same socioeconomic environment.

If education were only about what can be scored on a test, then we don’t need teachers, we need mind programmers

No Child Left Behind was based on the belief that a standard test would be the ultimate measure of a student’s success or failure. The assumption was that if student’s scores on a standardized test failed to achieve established goals then we could all blame the teachers and administrative staff, then punish them. The concept assumed that a student’s base level abilities, and parental support was irrelevant. No Child Left Behind was an idea that applied a corporate-like measurement system, which often fails in a business environment, and forced public schools to leave education behind in pursuit of goals that reduced students to do or die numbers.

The failure of No Child Left Behind is so spectacular that after a decade the program began, over two-thirds of the States are ranked at a “D” or “F” in the quality of education by StudentsFirst.org Report Card. 

Standardized tests assume that every child is an X, but in reality they are A to Z

Standardized tests assume that every child is an X, but in reality they can be A to Z

One of the major failures of the program was the institutionalizing of testing standards that encouraged teachers to focus on teaching their students how to successfully take the tests, but not to understand the material. The program ultimately forced out many excellent teachers that rejected the absurdity of No Child Left Behind, which is ironic because the goal was to force out less effective teachers. The result has been that school after school has failed to produce the results desired leaving America with a generation of students who are even less prepared for adult life.

Nevada’s Washoe County School District (WCSD) is typical of many school districts across the United States. For the 2010-11 school year the standardized tests indicated that an average of 85% of the high school students (9th-12th grades) met or exceeded the established standards for reading, writing, and math. Those scores would indicate that 85% of the students are prepared to move on from high school.

However, of the 1,600 Washoe County School District graduates that attended Nevada state-run universities, almost half (48%) of them required remedial classes to bring them up to college entrance-level work. The standardized tests are designed to measure competency; however, even though the scores indicate the students are prepared, almost 1 out of 2 need to take classes to address educational deficiencies.

Some might say this just confirms the inadequacy of public schools; however, if that were true the standardized tests should reflect those failures and they do not. It is the inadequacy of the standardized test to measure educational performance or lack of performance.  

Standardized tests can be an effective tool in education, but they are just one tool. If we truly want to improve the educational performance of America’s students we must stop holding a knife to the throat of teachers and schools and stop using simple-minded measurements of academic performance to determine whether they live or die. A teacher can’t be held accountable for a parent that doesn’t believe in homework, therefore causing the student to be behind the rest of her/his class. It’s time we began supporting the teachers who have years of training and experience in education, rather than applying failed business models that destroy public education.

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