AASA PROMOTES"REDEFINING READY" INITIATIVE

The American Association of School Administrators is promoting its new initiative, which urges consideration of numerous factors in determining if a student is "ready" for college, instead of reliance on one variable such as a "point in time" test.

"Redefining Ready", as the initiative is called, starts with a minimum GPA, and then provides a range of criteria in addition, of which a student should meet one or more to be considered "ready".

Here are the specifics of the Redefining Ready"initiative:

So minimally a student might have a 2.8+ GPA in high school and have gotten a "C" or better in Algebra 2, a 500 on each subtest of the SAT, a "C' or better in an AP or Dual Credit course, or a 3+ score on an AP test, and be considered "college ready".  This addresses the issue of the student who passes an AP or Dual Credit course and fails to meet the mark on the SAT or ACT - the student has demonstrated "College Readiness" on one measure but not on another.

We did some research on the class of 2016 (current seniors) to see how many met the GPA requirement. What we found was that 72% of our seniors met this first criterion. It will take a bit more research to see how many students who met the GPA requirement met one or more of the others, but we know that GPA is the most important predictor of college readiness.

However, use of these criteria could help parents understand what it takes for their child(ren) to demonstrate readiness, and that it's more than one high-stakes measure.

AASA is also promoting a "Career Ready" about which we are more uncertain:

Though some of the criteria for "Career Readiness" seem appropriate,  it seems that 90% attendance and 25 hours of community service might be appropriate for all students, not just those who are going to college. Perhaps the GPA requirement, attendance, and community service indicators could all be base requirements, and some combination of additional requirements might equal readiness for "Life After High School".

However, AASA has done a really good job of identifying multiple factors that are important for success, no matter the route students choose after they graduate from high school.

BOISE, BORAH, CAPITAL, TIMBERLINE

MAKE WASHINGTON POST LIST OF MOST CHALLENGING HIGH SCHOOLS...AGAIN

All four Boise District comprehensive high schools have made the 2016 Washington Post list of the "Most Challenging High Schools in America"  Seven Idaho schools were identified on this year's list: two high-income charters, Century High School (Pocatello) and the four Boise high schools. Approximately 11% of high schools nationwide were identified this year by the Post.

This is the 8th consecutive year that all four Boise District high schools have made the list. Capital has been on for 8 years, Borah 9, Timberline for 15, and Boise High School for 18 consecutive years.

The formula used by the Post's Jay Mathews, an education columnist, is simple - the number of Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate exams taken divided by the number of graduating seniors in the high school in a given year. The Washington Post list is intended to measure the access students have to rigorous coursework, and their willingness to participate in that curriculum.

Borah's Washington Post award plaque will be presented at Friday's Senator's Choice Academic Assembly in the Borah gymnasium..

"MOVING THE NEEDLE" WITH "GO ON" RATES?

YES WE ARE!

The State Board of Education has really just gotten started tracking "Go On" rates for Idaho's high schools using the National Student Clearinghouse, and has data back to the high school class of 2011. 

Luckily, the Southern Idaho Conference (SIC) Districts (Boise, West Ada, Mt. Home, Middleton, Nampa, Caldwell, Vallivue, Emmett, Kuna, and Bishop Kelly High School) have been tracking the data since the Class of 2007, and so have a wealth of information about "Go On" rates in the Treasure Valley.

These Districts are all members of the Treasure Valley Educational Partnership (TVEP), formed in 2011 by the Superintendents of the SIC to work with local businesses, non-profits, and higher ed institutions to promote education in the valley.

Following are some data about the college-going rates of SIC high schools, and the improvements that have occurred since we started tracking the data. TVEP chose as its goal to improve the percentage of students enrolled in college 2 years after high school graduation, upon which SIC districts were already focused. 

The overall SIC comprehensive high school "Go On"  rate for students who enroll in college within 2 years of high school graduation was 62% for the class of 2007. For the class of 2012, it was 69%. That's an increase of 7%. However, that growth figure is misleading - schools with high levels of free/reduced lunch showed much higher growth, and schools with lower percentages of freed/reduced lunch showed lower growth, simply because their rates were already quite high.

WITHIN 2 YEAR PERCENTAGES - SCHOOLS WITH

>40% FREE/REDUCED LUNCH

Let's start with schools with relatively high rates of free/reduced lunch. The statewide senior high average free/reduced percentage in 2013-14 was 41%. We'll use 40% as the indicator of poverty levels and "Go On" rates.

MERIDIAN HIGH SCHOOL

Meridian High School, in the West Ada District, has about 40% free/reduced lunch, and about 3% Limited English speakers.

Meridian's 2 year "Go On" rate has increased from 55% for the class of 2007 to 70% for the class of 2012 - 15%.

CALDWELL HIGH SCHOOL

Caldwell High School is the lone comprehensive high school in the Caldwell District. Caldwell High has 77% free/reduced lunch, and 6% of its students are Limited English.

Even so, Caldwell's 2 year "Go On" rate has improved by 10% since the class of 2007, from 50% to 60%. Even though the class of 2012 was 7 students larger than the class of 2007, 28 more students from the class of 2012 were enrolled in college after 2 years.

CAPITAL HIGH SCHOOL

Capital High School, in the Boise District, has 44% free/reduced lunch, and 3.5% Limited English. 

Capital's 2 year "Go On' rate has improved by 11% from the class of 2007 to the class of 2012, from 60% to 71%. Even though the class of 2012 graduating class was 40 students smaller, 20 more students were enrolled in college after 2 years than were in the class of 2007.

COLUMBIA HIGH SCHOOL

Columbia High School, in the Nampa District, has 59% free/reduced lunch, and 3% LEP.

Columbia's 2-year percentage has increased by 12% since the class of 2007, from 47% to 59%. Columbia's graduating class has increased by 50 since 2007, when it was a new school, but 129 more 2012 grads were enrolled in college after 2 years than were in 2007.

Certainly, those are impressive gains. Other schools that have shown strong "Go On" growth include Emmett (12%), Middleton (10%), Kuna (13%), and Vallivue (8%).

Borah High School's 2 - year rate had increased from 59% to 70% between the classes of 2007 and 2010, but has since dropped back to 62%. Much the same happened at Mt. Home High School, where the rate increased from 52% to 66% in the same period, only to drop back to 57%. The Nampa District's two other high schools, Skyview and Nampa, increased by 5% and 3%, respectively, from 2007 to 2012.

WITHIN 2 YEAR GO ON RATES -  SCHOOLS WITH < 40% 

FREE/REDUCED PERCENTAGES 

Six Treasure Valley high schools have rates of free/reduced lunch that are below the state average - Boise and Timberline in the Boise District, and Eagle, Mt. View, Centennial, and Rocky Mt. in West Ada. Each of these schools have very high "Go On" rates.

EAGLE HIGH SCHOOL

Eagle High School has about 15% free/reduced students, and 1% Limited English.

Though Eagle High School's "Go On" rate after two years increased by "only" 5 percent between the class of 2007 and the class of 2012, the 2012 rate was 80%.

TIMBERLINE HIGH SCHOOL

Timberline High has about 22% Free/Reduced lunch, and about 1% of its students are Limited English.

Timberline's 2-year "Go On" rate has increased only slightly since the class of 2007; however, it stood at 76% for the class of 2013.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN HIGH SCHOOL

Rocky Mountain is the newest high school in the West Ada District, so we only have data since 2009. Rocky has about 18% Free/reduced lunch, and less than 1% of its students are Limited English.

In the four classes for which we have data, Rocky Mountain's 2-year rate has increased by 9%; for the class of 2012, it stood at 76%.

BOISE HIGH SCHOOL

Boise High has 23% Free/Reduced lunch, and has seen increases in its Limited English population recently. Boise's LEP population is at about 2.5% of the total school enrollment.

Boise's "Go On" percentage has increased by 7% since the class of 2007, and stood at 81% for the class of 2012.

Centennial (32% FRL) and Mt. View (25%) , the other 2 high schools in the Treasure Valley with percentages of Free/Reduced lunch below the state average, each stood at 76% in 2-year "Go On" rates for the class of 2012.

It's impressive to see the growth in "Go On" percentages among most SIC schools that are high impacted by poverty, and in which many students struggle with the financial burdens of college-going. We are proud of the progress we are making.

There are, to be sure, a few SIC comprehensive high schools in which "Go On" rates have grown more slowly, and most alternative high schools have low rates of matriculation - most of the students at our alternative schools face obstacles to high school graduation, as well.

The information in this report is taken from the database of the Treasure Valley Educational Partnership, which is comprised of the SIC Superintendents and administrators, higher education representatives, local business people, and volunteer and non-profit organizations in the communities we represent.

THIS AND THAT FOR APRIL

Here are several local  stories from the past few weeks.

AP COMPUTER SCIENCE ENROLLMENT SOARS

A new, more practical Advanced Placement Computer Science course will be offered in the Boise District next fall, and student requests have skyrocketed. 

The new course, Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles, attracted 215 enrollments, and the existing course, AP Computer Science, saw 60 enrollees. The total enrollment of 275 students, is a far cry form the average district-wide enrollment in CS over the past few years.

Enrollment by high school in Computer Science, by high school:

Boise             79

Borah            53

Capital          84

Timberline   59

BOISE'S SURPLUS COMPUTERS HELP AFRICAN STUDENTS

Local engineer, volunteer extraordinaire, and world traveler Todd Fischer recently journeyed to Sierra Leone, and delivered surplus District Thinkpad laptop computers to the Massory Community Learning Center. The Massorians have created the Learning Center and built computer tables, power, and networking for the laptops. Todd reports that the community is very excited about the donation, and is putting the laptops to good use, as you can see.

BOISE DISTRICT VISITS BSU CAREER FAIR

Hoping to attract the best teachers to the Boise District, District Supervisors and Human Resources Director Blas Telleria visited the Boise State Career Fair on April 4. Blas reports that the Boise District table was mobbed by potential District teachers.

Below, Social Studies/Science Supervisor Chris Taylor, Math Supervisor Dr. Teri Thaemert, and Special Education Administrator Dr. Betty Olson visit with prospective teachers:

Boise's table was the star of the show:

KAREN GILLETTE RECEIVES TWIN HONOR

Karen Gillette, Lead Teacher at Boise's STEP program for 18-21 years olds with disabilities, was honored last week as a leading "Woman in Industry" by the Women's and Children's Association of Idaho. Karen is a distinguished educator who has devoted her career to working with children with disabilities. Congratulations, Karen!

Here she is receiving congratulations from Mayor Bieter:

ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL PLAYS THE EGYPTIAN

Nine time Grammy winning Texas Swing band Asleep at the Wheel played Boise's Egyptian Theatre Saturday night. What this has to do with this blog? Nothing! But it was a fine night of music.

THE BEST MEASURE OF COLLEGE READINESS

Idaho high school students earned over 100,000 college credits in 2014-15. What better measure of readiness for college than actually taking and passing courses certified by Boise State University, Northwest Nazarene University, the College of Western Idaho, and other colleges and universities, or taking Advanced Placement coursework and the rigorous AP tests that conclude the courses?

Dual Credit

Here's a slide portraying the growth in Dual Credit participation since 2008-09 by students across the state of Idaho. More than 8000 more students participated last year than did only six years ago.

In the ten districts of the Southern Idaho Conference (Emmett, Boise, Nampa, Caldwell, Kuna, Mountain Home, Vallivue, Middleton, West Ada, and Bishop Kelly), Dual Credit enrollment has grown from 1,820 students to 6,910. In other words, over four times as many students were enrolled last year in Dual Credit coursework than were just six years ago.

As you might expect, the number of Dual Credits earned by students statewide has also dramatically increased:

Locally, students earned 6305 Dual Credits in 2008-09, and in 2014-15, just 6 years later, the number was 28,848. That's well over 4 times as many credits earned as were earned in 2008-09.

Advanced Placement

In Dual Credit programs teachers are approved to teach the classes by the host university or college, and students must garner a grade of "B" in the course to receive the credits.

In Advanced Placement coursework, students take a rigorous national exam prepared by the College Board in order to qualify for college credit. The exams are graded at a central location, and students who receive a score of 3, 4, or 5 on a 1-5 scale are eligible for college credit at most universities and colleges nationwide.

Universities and colleges decide what credit they will provide for scores of 3, 4, or 5. The College Board has a website parents and students can check for the credit policies of colleges and universities.

Since Advanced Placement is viewed as the "gold standard" of rigorous coursework, and the exams are seen as very difficult, fewer students in many districts participate in Advanced Placement coursework. In 2014-15, the Boise District gave 37% of the AP exams statewide. 

Nevertheless, the number of students taking at least one AP exam has increased substantially during the same period of time. in 2008-09, about 4300 students participated in AP testing statewide; in 2014-15, the number was 6151.

In the Treasure Valley, 2198 students participated in AP testing in 2008-09. By 2014-15, 3496 students took AP tests.

The number of AP exams taken statewide has gone from about 700o in 2008-09 to 10442 in 2014-15. Students received a score of "3" or better on 65% of the exams in 2014-15, meaning that over 6700 exams were eligible for credit. At 3 credits per eligible exam, Idaho students were eligible for over 20,000 college credits via AP exams in 2014-15.

In 2014-15, Treasure Valley students were eligible for over half of the credits earned in the state, at over 11,700.

When you add it all up, Idaho students earned over 100,000 credits from colleges and universities across the country in 2014-15.

With State Board of Education analyses indicating that students who participate in these Advanced Opportunities go on to college at a much higher rate (71%) than do those who don't participate (45%), and come back for sophomore year at a much higher rate (80% compared with 63%) we know we are on the right track with Dual Credit and AP classes.

Idaho's legislature recently passed legislation to provide each Idaho student with fiscal support for Dual Credit fees and AP exam fees to the tune of over $4600.  Our students are receiving the support they need to be prepared for the future. 

THOSE CRAZY "COLLEGE READINESS" INDICATORS

In Sunday's Idaho Statesman, an economist writing in the "Guest Opinion" section made this statement about SAT performance of Idaho's students:

"The 17.8 percent (college-ready) estimate is the share of Idaho’s students scoring above 500 on each section of the SAT. Let’s call this Measure 1. The 25.7 percent (college-ready) estimate is the share of Idaho’s students scoring 1550 on all three sections. Let’s call this Measure 2."...

and then later in the opinion:

"Regardless of the measure, the takeaway is the same: the large majority of Idaho’s students are not prepared for life after high school."

So it's really not important which way you analyze the results, because every measure will show the low performance of Idaho students, which the author characterized as "at best average in the share of high school students who are college and career ready."

The issue, however, is that it does matter, and that measures of "college readiness" are providing us with dramatically different estimates of where Idaho's high school college readiness performance stands.

THE SAT AND PSAT

The SAT is a college-readiness test administered to all juniors in Idaho and provided by the College Board, which also publishes a test called the PSAT (Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test) which is taken by 10th graders across Idaho. The College Board also provides the Advanced Placement examinations, which are administered to students taking AP courses at the conclusion of the course.

For the past several years, there have been 3 subtests on the SAT - Reading, Math, and Writing. But the April 2016 administration of the SAT to all juniors will be with a test revised to align with the Idaho Core standards, and will have only 2 subtests, Evidence-Based Reading and Writing and Math. Here is the performance of Idaho and Boise students on the 2015 administration of the (old) test.

The first administration of the "new" PSAT to all sophomores was in October 2015, with results arriving in January. The new PSAT  (and new SAT ) are meant to predict preparation for entry level college courses in math and language arts in 2 and 4-year colleges. Here are the results of the first Idaho administration of the PSAT:

Note that PSAT math performance and passage of both tests  is considerably higher than on the "old" SAT, and that ERW performance is far above that seen on the old SAT in Reading or Writing.

SBAC

But wait- there's more! Idaho conducted the first administration of the SBAC (Smarter Balanced Assessment) last spring, tying up computers across the state for weeks on end. The SBAC results, promised by the end of the school year, turned up in late July.

So, math readiness on the old SAT and on the SBAC matches up fairly well, but the PSAT readiness indicator is quite a bit higher; in Reading, the new PSAT features readiness percentages that are far higher than the old SAT, and the SBAC readiness  percentages are somewhere in the middle.

Is the percentage of Idaho "college ready" students in Reading 37%, as the old SAT indicated, or is it 90%, as the PSAT said, or 61%, as the SBAC noted? Who knows?

And this brings us to a final indicator, which will be the subject of the next Data Points post. Next time we'll have a look at the growth in Dual Credit and Advanced Placement coursework across the state and in the Treasure Valley. This post will focus on student participation in these programs and college credits earned by Idaho students - the most reliable indicator of readiness, we'd say.

Read more here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/readers-opinion/article64197297.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/readers-opinion/article64197297.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/readers-opinion/article64197297.html#storylink=cpy

UNDERSTANDING THE 60% GOAL

The Idaho State Board of Education established what's known as the "60% goal" in 2010. The language of the goal is:

"Sixty percent of Idahoans between the ages of 25-34 will have a 

post-secondary degree or a certificate of value by the year 2020."

According to the State Board President, Emma Atchley, (in the SBOE publication "The Facts 2015") "Since that time, our state has seen a 5 percentage point increase toward the goal. Last year, 42 percent of Idahoans in that age range had degrees or certificates."

It's interesting to consider the State Board's goal in light of job projections made by the Idaho Department of Labor. The Department has an interesting  publication entitled "Projections of Idaho Jobs by Industry and Occupation 2012-2022" which provides detailed information about their forecasting. Here's a slide from the publication:

Note that the Department of Labor projections predict that 27% of jobs will require a bachelor's degree or higher (18% BA, 7% MA, 3% doctoral or professional degree), while 32% will require an Associate's degree or some college (9% Associate's degree, 23% some college). That's a total of roughly 60% of jobs that will require some college experience or more.

State Board officials explained the difference in the Board's goal by saying "We are not counting some college as an outcome that counts toward the goal. That category is very hard to quantify because it's difficult to determine how much college is sufficient. Because the certificates are tied into that same college category (and are quantifiable) that's the only part of the group that the Board is counting."

The explanation makes sense, because it would be extremely difficult to determine which students took only one class or one semester, and which others were engaged in a full-time major over several years.

However, it's interesting to look at the difference it makes when we count "some college, no degree" as part of the SBOE goal. For example, the class of 2008 is now seven years out of high school. We estimate the high school graduation rate at Boise High School as about 93% (using the new federal rules for high school grad rate). Approximately 51% of those entering college have graduated with a BA, MA, or a certificate. Thus, Boise's college grad rate for the class of 2008 under the State Board goal is 47% thus far.

However, if we use the "some college, no degree" definition from the Department of Labor's 
projections, Boise's total percentage of students who have a BA, AA, certificate or some college for the class of 2008 is 83.6%. Multiplying by the high school grad rates of 92.3%, we come up with a percentage of 78% thus far for that class, far higher than the 60% SBOE goal.

It seems that some consideration should be given to the portion of the population that has attended college for a particular amount of time, or perhaps accumulated a certain number of credits in a field, but not graduated, in terms of the SBOE goal. There are hundreds of students in our database who have attended for two or more years, but not gotten a degree.

Just as example, here are the data for the four Boise comprehensive high schools, including the "some college, no degree" category:

Boise High School - 78%
Borah High School - 64%
Capital High School - 71%
Timberline High School - 77%