THE ANATOMY OF SUCCESS: Lessons from Schools on the Achievement Frontier Detroit Public Schools January, 2007

First, some good news. After more than a decade of fairly flat achievement and stagnant or growing gaps, we appear to be turning the corner.

NAEP Reading, 9 Year-Olds: Record Performance for All Groups Source: National Center for Education Statistics, NAEP 2004 Trends in Academic Progress Note: Long-Term Trends NAEP

Latino-White Gap Narrows to Smallest Size in History NAEP Reading, 9 Year-Olds Source: National Center for Education Statistics, NAEP 2004 Trends in Academic Progress Note: Long-Term Trends NAEP

NAEP Math, 9 Year-Olds: Record Performance for All Groups Source: National Center for Education Statistics, NAEP 2004 Trends in Academic Progress Note: Long-Term Trends NAEP

African American-White Gap Narrows to Smallest Size in History NAEP Math, 9 Year-Olds Source: National Center for Education Statistics, NAEP 2004 Trends in Academic Progress Note: Long-Term Trends NAEP

Bottom Line: When We Really Focus on Something, We Make Progress Clearly, much more remains to be done in elementary and middle school. Too many youngsters still enter high school way behind. But the bigger problem is that we’re not really building on these successes in the upper grades.

Achievement Flat in Reading 13 Year-Olds, NAEP Source: US Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. NAEP 1999 Trends in Academic Progress (p. 107) Washington, DC: US Department of Education, August 2000

Achievement Flat or Declining in Reading, 17 year olds, NAEP Source: NAEP 2004 Trends in Academic Progress. Note: Long-Term Trends NAEP

Math? At first blush, appears to be trending upwards. But, value added in middle and high school math actually declined during the nineties.

Value Added Declining in Middle School Math... Age 9-13 Growth Source: NAEP 1999 Trends in Academic Progress

Gaps between groups wider today than in 1990 …

NAEP Reading, 17 Year-Olds Source: National Center for Education Statistics, NAEP 2004 Trends in Academic Progress Note: Long-Term Trends NAEP

The U.S. Ranks Low Among Participating Countries in Each of the International Math Assessments Given in 2003 US Average Source: American Institutes For Research, November 2005, Reassessing U.S. Mathematics Performance: New Findings from the 2003 TIMSS and PISA Average US Note: Countries in this analysis participated in all three of these assessments.

These gaps begin before children arrive at the schoolhouse door. But, rather than organizing our educational system to ameliorate this problem, we organize it to exacerbate the problem. How? By giving students who arrive with less, less in school, too.

Nation: Inequities in State and Local Revenue Per Student Gap High Poverty vs. Low Poverty Districts -$907 per student High Minority vs. Low Minority Districts -$614 per student Source: The Education Trust, The Funding Gap Data are for 2003

In truth, some of the most devastating “lesses” are a function of choices that we educators make. Choices we make about what to expect of whom…

Source: Prospects (ABT Associates, 1993), in “Prospects: Final Report on Student Outcomes”, PES, DOE, Students in Poor Schools Receive ‘A’s for Work That Would Earn ‘Cs’ in Affluent Schools

Choices we make about what to teach whom…

Source: CCSSO, State Indicators of Science and Mathematics Education, 2005 Fewer Latino students are enrolled in Algebra 1 in Grade 8

And choices we make about Who teaches whom…

More Classes in High-Poverty, High- Minority Schools Taught By Out-of-Field Teachers *Teachers lacking a college major or minor in the field. Data for secondary-level core academic classes. Source: Richard M. Ingersoll, University of Pennsylvania. Original analysis for the Ed Trust of Schools and Staffing Survey. High poverty Low povertyHigh minority Low minority Note: High Poverty school-50% or more of the students are eligible for free/reduced price lunch. Low-poverty school -15% or fewer of the students are eligible for free/reduced price lunch. High-minority school - 50% or more of the students are nonwhite. Low-minority school- 15% or fewer of the students are nonwhite.

Poor and Minority Students Get More Inexperienced* Teachers Source: National Center for Education Statistics, “Monitoring Quality: An Indicators Report,” December *Teachers with 3 or fewer years of experience. High poverty Low poverty High minority Low minority Note: High poverty refers to the top quartile of schools with students eligible for free/reduced price lunch. Low poverty- bottom quartile of schools with students eligible for free/reduced price lunch. High minority-top quartile; those schools with the highest concentrations of minority students. Low minority-bottom quartile of schools with the lowest concentrations of minority students

Students Graduate From High School At Different Rates, 2001* * 4-Year Graduation Rates Source: Jay P. Greene and Greg Forster, “Public High School Graduation and College Readiness Rates in the United States,” Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, September 2003.

ADD IT ALL UP...

For Every 100 White Kindergartners: (25-to 29-Year-Olds) Source: US Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. March Current Population Surveys, , in The Condition of Education graduate from high school 66 complete at least some college 34 obtain at least a bachelors degree

For every 100 African American Kindergarteners 89 graduate from high school 51 complete at least some college 18 obtain at least a bachelors degree

For Every 100 Latino Kindergartners : 62 graduate from high school 31 complete at least some college 10 obtain at least a bachelors degree

For Every 100 American Indian/Alaskan Native Kindergartners: 71 graduate from high school 30 complete at least some college 12 obtain at least a bachelors degree

MOVING FORWARD

Improving Preparation: Four things K-12 and higher education can do …

A. Don’t be bashful about pressing for all students to graduate high school “college ready.” High impact schools aim high for all students. Even when they start with high dropout rates, they aim students toward college and careers.

B. Add your voice to the movement to make the “college prep” curriculum the default curriculum for all students.

High School Curriculum Intensity is a Strong Predictor of Bachelor’s Degree Completion Source: Clifford Adelman, U.S. Department of Education, The Toolbox Revisited, Curriculum quintiles are composites of English, math, science, foreign language, social studies, computer science, Advanced Placement, the highest level of math, remedial math and remedial English classes taken during high school.

Single biggest predictor of post- high school success is QUALITY AND INTENSITY OF HIGH SCHOOL CURRICULUM Source: Cliff Adelman, 2006, The Toolbox Revisited, U.S. Department of Education.

C. Historically, most of the really important decisions about what students should learn and what kind of work was “good enough” was left to individual teachers.

Students can do no better than the assignments they are given...

D. Good teachers matter big time.

Students in Dallas Gain More in Math with Effective Teachers: One Year Growth From 3 rd -4 th Grade Source: Heather Jordan, Robert Mendro, and Dash Weerasinghe, The Effects of Teachers on Longitudinal Student Achievement, 1997.

Identify and fix “choke points” in student progression—courses where availability and/or disproportionate failure blocks student progression.

What can we do? Focus on how to improve the written, taught, and tested curriculum in order to improve student achievement. Improve the written—through a rigorous curriculum for all students Improve the taught—through effective teachers for all students Improve the tested curriculum—through monitoring student learning and teacher effectiveness.