Commentary; Posted: 9/7/05
Congrats, cautions for FL schools
Joe Nathan
Guest Columnist
Congrats and a hint of caution to Forest Lake educators, families and students. Thatís my reaction to the massive dump of education data that occurred this week. The Minnesota Department of Education told every public school and district whether it was meeting required progress in reading, writing and mathematics.
Forest Lake district public schools met the stateís expectations for progress, except with special education students in the secondary schools. At several grade levels, your students did better than the state average.
For example, 77 percent of Forest Lake 11th graders were proficient in math, compared to the state average of 72 percent, and 82 percent of your 10th graders were proficient in reading (state average was 81 percent).
North Lakes Academy 7th graders did especially well, compared to other middle school students around the state. At this charter public school, 90 percent of the students were proficient in math, compared to the state average of 76 percent. Some 83 percent of the 7th graders were proficient in reading, compared to the state average of 74 percent.
The Minnesota Department of Education noted that the number of schools on the ìneeds improvement listî dropped from ì464 schools in 2004 (1969 schools measured) to 247 schools in 2005 (1975 schools measured), a nearly 50 percent reduction.î
The vast majority of charter and district public schools improved.
So, where does the caution come in?
Two reasons:
First, we know that everything important about a school isnít measured by standardized, paper pencil tests. Itís important to look at other factors.
These include school safety, percentage of students involved in extra curricular activities, which have been proven enormously valuable, sometimes throughout a personís life, and experiences of high school graduates.
That leads to the second caution.
Next week Iíll be writing about a major Minnesota report on the number and percentage of Minnesota public high school graduates who need to take remedial courses when entering public colleges and universities. Some of the results are really startling. More about that next week.
For the time being, however, letís give credit where itís due ñ and thatís clearly to the educators, students and families in Forest Lake.
Thereís plenty to be proud of in your schools.
Joe Nathan, a former public school teacher, now directs the Center for School Change, Humphrey Institute, University of Minnesota.
Forest Lake Times
P.O. Box 218
880 SW 15 St.
Forest Lake, MN 55025
651-464-4601
Fax 651-464-4605