School Rankings
* Re “Poverty Provides Wealth of Reasons for School’s Low Ranking,” Valley Perspective, Feb. 27.
Judy Chiasson deserves credit for stating the central problem with ranking schools by academic performance. Why bother computing [the] Academic Performance Index when the rankings would be almost exactly the same if you were to give the readily available socioeconomic ranking of the schools?
The relationship between socioeconomic factors and standardized test scores is a highly significant statistical correlation. Being a retired principal of several Los Angeles elementary schools for over 25 years, I recall two schools in particular--one in the top 5% and the other in the bottom 5% in [pre-API] rankings. The difference in the test scores of the two student bodies was not a result of differences in teaching ability but rather of the students and their affluence or poverty.
I observed outstanding teaching in the school with the lower test scores as well as in the school with the higher scores. As Chiasson points out, “The difference is economics.”
It is illogical to try to rate schools or teachers solely on the basis of test performance.
GEORGE NORSTRAND
Northridge
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