When she got the letter explaining that her children had the option to transfer from Paul Culley Elementary School to a more successful campus, Becky Smith dismissed it as baloney.
No school, Smith said, could be better than Culley.
Starting its second year as one of Clark County School District’s eight “empowerment” schools, Culley receives extra funding in exchange for tougher accountability measures. For the 2006-07 academic year, Culley made strong gains on standardized test scores. 数据挖掘研究院
But it wasn’t enough to satisfy the requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act, the federal education reform initiative.
As a result, Culley, along with 40 other schools that receive extra federal money for students from low-income families, must offer students the chance to transfer to other schools, at the district’s expense.
More than 30,000 students are eligible for transfers. But the district doesn’t expect more than a few hundred of them to take advantage of the opportunity. 数据挖掘研究院
Why so few?
In some cases, it’s because parents are satisfied with the quality of their children’s education, even if test scores are below state standards, or are reluctant to have their children bused away from the neighborhood.
Critics say Clark County, like most of the nation’s school districts, isn’t doing a good enough job of informing parents of their options or making it an attractive offer.
Since 2002, the first year the district was required to provide school choice, the number of qualifying campuses has grown from four to 41. In each of those years, only 2 percent of eligible students have taken advantage of the transfer opportunity.
And those numbers are not expected to soar this year. 数据挖掘实验室
In August the district mailed letters to 30,364 families of children at Title I schools eligible for the program. As of Aug. 27, just 121 postcards were returned asking for transfers. Schools with the highest percentages of students from low-income households receive funding through the federal Title I program. 数据挖掘研究院
The low response might be a good thing for the district. If every student opted for a transfer, the district would be hard-pressed to find enough room at other schools.
If more students were to opt for transfers than the district could accommodate, the law requires that priority be given to the lowest-achieving students from low-income families. 数据挖掘研究院
Transfer students must be sent to a school in good standing with the Nevada Education Department that has available classroom seats and is relatively nearby. Because finding campuses that meet all of the criteria is becoming increasingly difficult, “relatively nearby” is a squishy definition. Students who leave Von Tobel Middle School in Las Vegas for Del Webb Middle School in Henderson are taken on a 22-mile one-way journey. 数据挖掘研究院
Jeanne Allen, president of the Center for Education Reform in Washington, D.C., said Clark County’s low participation in school choice is mirrored in nearly every state. 数据挖掘研究院
“Most districts have treated the choice program much the same way they treat most school processes — bureaucratically and lethargically,” Allen said. “They have an obligation they don’t take seriously.”
If districts were really behind the choice program, they would put more effort and energy into outreach, Allen said.
Districts have a financial incentive to make school choice programs difficult to navigate, Allen said. The federal law requires districts to set aside 20 percent of their Title I funding for school choice and tutoring programs at low-performing schools. Unspent money reverts to the district. That could change, however, as No Child Left Behind is up for reauthorization. A number of advocacy groups and lawmakers, along with Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, think districts should forfeit any unspent tutoring and school choice money back to the feds. 数据挖掘研究院
Typically less than 1 percent of Clark County’s set-aside Title I funds are spent on school choice, said Patsy Saas, a director in the district’s Title I office, which oversees the choice program. All the remaining money, about $4 million this year, is spent on the tutoring programs, she said. 数据挖掘研究院
Saas said the district does the best it can to notify parents of the options. But each year about one-quarter of the notification letters sent to parents are returned because the address is no longer valid. Given the district’s high transiency rate, that’s not surprising, Saas said.
Several Culley parents said this week they had not received a district letter about the choice program.
Among them: Debbie Harper, who has lived in the area since 1999.
“You would think I would have gotten a letter since I’m secretary of the PTA,” Harper said with a laugh.
Even if she had been notified, Harper said, she would not have considered transferring her daughter — fourth grader Alexi — to another school. Principal Lisa Primas is guiding the students exactly where they need to go, Harper said.
“They’ve made such strides that nobody thought could happen here,” Harper said. “There are after-school programs, the science lab. If my daughter’s happy, she’s learning. And she loves it here.”
Parent Lamont Price can relate to attending a school outside his neighborhood. Growing up in Los Angeles in the 1970s, he was bused with a few other black students to a better school in the San Fernando Valley. He said he got a better education.
But he’s not yet willing to put his daughter, a first grader at Culley, on the bus. It’s only the second week of school, and Price says he’s impressed with what he’s seen.
This week, Price watched his daughter greet her teacher with a hug before lining up with her classmates.
“If kids aren’t comfortable, they won’t do well in school,” Price said. “It all looks good so far, so I’m gonna give it a chance.” 数据挖掘研究院
