High School Test Scores: L.A. Picture Is Clouded

The state’s first-ever “report cards,” six pages of numbers on each high school, reflect well on a few San Fernando Valley campuses but paint a generally bleak picture of the Los Angeles School District.

The mass of statistics, released last week by the state Department of Education, is designed to allow school officials, teachers and parents to see how their school compares to others and to chart its progress.

But taken as a whole, the numbers in Los Angeles are not encouraging.

Only six of the district’s 49 comprehensive high schools scored at or above the state and national average score (897) on the Scholastic Aptitude Test last year. They are El Camino in Woodland Hills (938), University High in West Los Angeles (928), Taft in Woodland Hills (924), Palisades (916), North Hollywood (914) and Venice (908).

No others exceeded the state average of 421 on the verbal part of the SAT, but five schools scored better than the state average of 476 on the math portion. They are: Van Nuys (488), Narbonne in the Harbor area (481), Kennedy in Granada Hills (480), Fairfax on the Westside (478) and Chatsworth (477).

Only six of the 49 high schools met or exceeded the state average score on the California Assessment Program, the basic skills test given to all seniors. They were: Chatsworth, El Camino, Granada Hills, Palisades, University and Taft.

And even better-scoring Los Angeles high schools fared poorly when compared to other similar schools across the state. All of the eight district high schools serving a generally affluent, well-educated area scored well below the average on both tests when matched against high schools with similar students elsewhere in California.

It was the same at the other end of the scale as well: With only an occasional exception, the district high schools serving poor or lower middle-class neighborhoods scored below schools in similar neighborhoods around the state.

Top district officials were somewhat at a loss to explain the results.

“That appears to be the pattern, and it means we need to work harder,” said Los Angeles Supt. Harry Handler. “Our relative position is low, but these are only the base-line data.”

Handler noted that the city high schools restored the sixth period of instruction and raised their graduation standards only last year, too late to have much effect on the students measured for this first set of report cards.

Other officials doubted that the state’s attempt to match comparable schools was fair and said the Los Angeles schools had more severe problems.

“I don’t find (the results) to be startling. It just expresses mathematically the reality of a large, urban school district,” said Paul Possemato, director of the district’s senior high school division.

The Los Angeles district has a greater percentage of students from impoverished or non-English-speaking families, he said, and “even in the better schools you get a cross section of an urban community.”

Possemato also said that it was his hunch that Los Angeles, “such a busy, cosmopolitan area,” tends to hurt the performance of schoolchildren.

“I’m talking about the entertainment, the cars and videos--all these distractions that tend to pull kids away and make them indifferent to school,” Possemato said.

Handler, the district superintendent, said he still supports the effort by Bill Honig, the state superintendent of public instruction, to grade the schools, even though the first results don’t shine a favorable light on the Los Angeles district.

“I agree with the criticism that some of these measures are too narrow. But this is information that should be available to the public,” Handler said. He said parents should contact their local high school if they want to see the entire report.

He also said he hoped Honig’s effort would provoke a “healthy debate” among teachers, school officials and parents about what other measures could be used to evaluate the schools. As as example, he said “you could ask how many of the young people obtain employment or go directly into post-secondary education, and then you could follow up the next year to see how many are still employed or still in school.”

Such information is not collected routinely now, but “I’m encouraging our people to consider some other measures like these,” Handler said.

A High School Report Card The state’s review of 36 public high schools in the San Fernando Valley area

TEST RESULTS COURSE SAT SAT Advanced High School Verbal Math Placement Math English Science State Average 421 476 9.5% 67% 73% 33% LOS ANGELES DISTRICT Birmingham 408 464 17.4 59 60 31 Canoga Park 383 464 10.1 70 51 33 Chatsworth 406 477 25.2 62 69 33 Cleveland 403 471 8.8 47 55 21 El Camino Real 436 502 30.0 56 62 25 Francis Poly 383 461 3.1 47 50 28 Granada Hills 404 472 17.3 70 72 37 Grant 401 469 28.1 62 70 21 Kennedy 412 480 9.5 53 56 28 Monroe 408 466 14.5 64 66 30 North Hollywood 427 487 29.6 56 58 26 17 Reseda 373 448 4.9 56 86 30 San Fernando 342 404 6.0 47 35 19 Sylmar 393 439 3.6 48 74 18 Taft 425 499 11.8 59 57 31 Van Nuys 406 488 18.2 65 73 27 Verdugo Hills 387 463 7.4 35 44 19 BURBANK UNIFIED DISTRICT Burbank 409 484 9.0 73 90 30 Burroughs 423 460 9.0 67 77 21 CONEJO VALLEY UNIFIED DISTRICT Newbury Park 428 486 9.6 77 85 27 Thousand Oaks 439 490 11.6 83 90 33 Westlake 449 500 22.2 84 89 34 WILLIAM S. HART HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICT Canyon 420 487 8.3 62 68 51 Hart 416 494 6.9 77 76 53 Saugus 453 499 1.7 56 82 44 LAS VIRGENES UNIFIED DISTRICT Agoura 462 502 19.1 78 98 44 Calabasas 451 501 25.8 82 93 44 MOORPARK UNIFIED DISTRICT Moorpark 439 478 0.0 57 94 30 OAK PARK UNIFIED DISTRICT Oak Park 431 474 0.0 83 100 40 OXNARD UNION HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICT Camarillo **NA NA 2.9 84 71 38 Channel Islands NA NA 2.2 68 69 31 Hueneme NA NA 0.0 73 66 34 Oxnard NA NA 1.9 82 67 27 Rio Mesa NA NA 0.3 89 86 43 SIMI VALLEY UNIFIED DISTRICT Royal 439 491 13.5 82 76 50 Simi Valley 425 474 5.7 76 84 44

ENROLLMENTS* History/ Social Foreign Fine High School Science Language Arts State Average 52% 22% 65% LOS ANGELES DISTRICT Birmingham 15 29 83 Canoga Park 11 12 77 Chatsworth 14 26 66 Cleveland 22 11 63 El Camino Real 14 24 55 Francis Poly 12 14 54 Granada Hills 14 26 87 Grant 14 25 91 Kennedy 16 25 72 Monroe 18 25 74 North Hollywood 427 24 60 Reseda 11 20 91 San Fernando 8 9 46 Sylmar 8 10 84 Taft 9 30 72 Van Nuys 18 19 61 Verdugo Hills 11 20 55 BURBANK UNIFIED DISTRICT Burbank 50 35 79 Burroughs 52 15 77 CONEJO VALLEY UNIFIED DISTRICT Newbury Park 16 32 57 Thousand Oaks 23 32 59 Westlake 28 45 67 WILLIAM S. HART HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICT Canyon 14 15 88 Hart 15 15 80 Saugus 13 8 86 LAS VIRGENES UNIFIED DISTRICT Agoura 58 22 67 Calabasas 71 30 68 MOORPARK UNIFIED DISTRICT Moorpark 5 20 70 OAK PARK UNIFIED DISTRICT Oak Park 75 38 97 OXNARD UNION HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICT Camarillo 13 25 65 Channel Islands 4 18 63 Hueneme 5 19 56 Oxnard 6 14 56 Rio Mesa 6 23 54 SIMI VALLEY UNIFIED DISTRICT Royal 24 16 63 Simi Valley 28 13 72

SAT VERBAL: Average score among students taking the Scholastic Achievement Test college entranceexamination. Results range from 200 to 800. SAT MATH: Average score among students taking the Scholastic Achievement Test college entrance examination. Results range from 200 to 800. ADVANCED PLACEMENT: Percentage of students who passed Advanced Placement examinations this year with a score of 3 or above. *COURSE ENROLLMENTS: Percentage of students enrolled in classes in particular subject areas: math for three years, English for four years, science for three years, social science for four years, foreign language for three years, fine arts for one year. **NA: Scores not available

A look at how one Valley high school succeeded on the first report cards, Page 6. Andfigures for schools in Valley-area districts, Page 12.