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United States News Title: Milwaukee Teachers Don't Deserve the Compensation They Get -- They Suck Among 17 urban school districts that participated in a national science assessment in 2009, Milwaukee students in fourth and eighth grades scored below the average performance of their respective peers attending public schools in other large cities, according to a new report. On the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also called the Nation's Report Card, Milwaukee's fourth-graders ranked 11th out of 17 urban districts based on the percentage of its children who scored at or above a basic level of science achievement. In eighth grade, Milwaukee ranked 13th out of 17 big-city districts based on the percentage of students who scored at or above basic. Basic is defined as having partial mastery of the material presented on the test, which featured questions about physical science, life science, and Earth and space sciences. NAEP is known for its 50-state assessment, and results of that were released last month for science. But NAEP's Trial Urban District Assessment - released Thursday for science - is specifically focused on the performance of children in big-city districts. It warrants attention because it helps urban districts that participate gauge how their students are doing compared with those in several of the country's other high-minority, high-poverty school systems. At a presentation of the urban-district data Thursday morning in Boston, experts pointed out that the average achievement deficit in science between kids in big-city districts and kids nationally is worse than the average deficit between those two groups in reading and math. "While these urban districts performed less well than the nation in reading and math, they performed even further below, at a greater deficit, in science," said Alan J. Friedman, a member of the National Assessment Governing Board, which sets policy for the NAEP. Friedman pondered whether big cities have taken to heart the No Child Left Behind law, which emphasizes raising reading and math test scores, more aggressively than the rest of the country, neglecting science instruction in the process. "Nothing wrong with reading and math, but what happened to science?" Friedman said. He added that a strong background in that subject was necessary for students to move into a variety of professional careers. Heidi Ramirez, chief academic officer for Milwaukee Public Schools, said the science scores provide a baseline for science improvement in the district. "This provides additional evidence of the need for developing the math and science comprehensive plan that is already under way," she said. Milwaukee Public Schools is restructuring its science and math curriculum from kindergarten through 12th grade. The push has been supported by the GE Foundation, which awarded the district a $20.4 million grant to improve curriculum and its business management operations. The latest results were taken from a sample of 1,300 students in 90 Milwaukee schools in fourth grade, and 1,000 students in 60 schools in eighth grade, according to NAEP. The assessments were graded on a scale from 0 to 300, with percentages of students identified as basic, proficient or advanced in their mastery of the material. Urban districts typically score below the national average on NAEP exams, and that was no different with this latest science test. But Milwaukee's performance in the urban-district assessments is concerning because it shows the district hovering near the bottom even when compared with other big-city school systems that teach similar high-poverty, high-minority populations of students, many of whom have disabilities or are learning English at greater rates than their public-school counterparts elsewhere. In the latest science results: •34;44% of MPS fourth-graders scored at or above basic (32% scored basic; 12% scored proficient), compared with 55% of students in large cities and 72% of students in public schools nationally. •34;In eighth grade, 28% of MPS students scored at or above basic (23% basic, 5% proficient), compared with 44% of students in large cities and 62% of students nationally. •34;MPS students learning English in fourth grade scored at or above basic at a higher rate than their peers who are not learning a new language at that grade, 47% to 44%, respectively. In previous urban-district assessments: •34;The Trial Urban District Assessment for 18 districts in math, released in late 2009, showed that Milwaukee's fourth-grade students outperformed Detroit; Cleveland; Washington, D.C.; and Fresno, Calif. In eighth-grade math, Milwaukee students outscored only Detroit. •34;The Trial Urban District Assessment for 18 districts in reading, released in spring 2010, showed that Milwaukee's fourth-graders outperformed Detroit, Cleveland and Philadelphia, while its eighth-graders outperformed Detroit; Fresno, Calif.; and Washington, D.C. A few urban districts posted more promising results on the latest science test. Austin, Texas; Charlotte, N.C.; Jefferson County (which covers Louisville) in Kentucky; and Miami-Dade in Florida had higher science scores at both grades in comparison with the average scores for large cities in the nation. San Diego, Boston and Houston saw one grade level score higher than the average for large cities.
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#2. To: no gnu taxes (#0)
Why train teachers at all. NatGuard should do the job as well. ;} " Complexity as a function of finance, therefore, is perhaps measured best by levels of global wealth inequality, and as mentioned before, these levels are still getting worse (more unequal). However, there comes a tipping point at which an overly-complex system begins to consume itself, as the peripheral networks and central hubs become less stable and less attached to the overall structure of the system. In this sense, the more damaging a crisis is to the ability of populations around the world to maintain their relative share of the global wealth pie, meager as it may be, the more difficult it will be for existing financial elites to maintain global complexity, order and control." One ring to rule them All And in the Darkness bind them. My precious. ;}
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