WHForums and Talk of West Hartford have pulled some interesting data together about our local test score debate. You can get my take and links to the earlier posts here at FM. The two new posts I’d like to highlight are these:

• Free/Reduced Lunch Eligibility and Hartford County Test Scores - WH Forums
• CMT Scores and Per Pupil Spending - Greater Hartford Area - Talk of West Hartford

Both are interesting posts and worth considering.

I suspect they also say a lot about how each of those writers approaches the school budget debate (as this post will say about mine, shortly). Basically, ToWH focuses on outlays, per pupil expenditure vs. results as measured by the tests. WH Forums takes a different tack, starting with the question of “what makes our town different than Avon, Simsbury, and Farmington” and proposing a theory.

To me, both are valid starting points. In fact, the only concern I have is using this test score as a proxy for “results”… but since it’s easy to turn into a number and easy to correlate that to other numbers, there we go.

So, I’ve done a couple of things that I hope help the debate out a bit. First, I’ve put the numbers from ToWH’s post and the 2000 census data on median household income by town into a spreadsheet. I’ve put that spreadsheet online at Google Docs so everyone can look at it, re-sort it, and download it. I’ve invited both ToWH and WH Forums’ writers in as collaborators, as well. If you want to add data to the spreadsheet, feel free to drop me a line at codesujal -at- gmail and I’ll invite you in. I took the census numbers from the Dept. of Economic and Community Development’s site and I’ve added that spreadsheet to Google Docs as well.

Second, the per pupil numbers are interesting to say the least. Hartford City Public Schools spend by and far the most dollars per pupil. The next thing I’m going to do when I have a moment is dig through the budget breakdowns to see how they allocate money vs. West Hartford. Here are the relevant links:

• Hartford Public Schools 06-07 budget — (here’s the executive summary, which contains most of the info I was looking for
• West Hartford Public Schools 08-09 budget

The executive summary for the WHPS system doesn’t contain the same level of detail as the Hartford one, so I’ll have to cull that from the Section C Breakdowns (PDF link). It looks a little daunting and I need to get back to work on my real job. So, that will come later.

Finally, looking through all of these numbers, I’d like to summarize how I’m seeing the conversation evolve. We’ve got two conversations, really, that are going on together. First is the bottom-line expenditures by the school district and the size of the budget overall. There are many people understandably upset about the overall growth in the budget. This conversation is, to me, focused on purely fiscal issues — comparative pay of school administrators and teachers vs. other towns, audits looking for waste in school expenditures, etc. The second conversation is about whether the WHPS budget is delivering appropriately for the town. This conversation is about test scores, programs, and student outcomes.

The two conversations could be happening without the other. One could be perfectly satisfied with the school performance but feel like it should be or could be cheaper. One could also be perfectly fine with the tax rate, but care about test scores and our relative performance to other districts, to dropout rates, to college attendance rates, etc.

Because of the budget debate, though, I think both are happening together, and are being used as ammunition by each side of both. It’s also pretty clear to me that the conversation one focuses on indicates an underlying stance on the budget issue. Speaking for myself, I’m focused on the test results because the tax issue is tied to why I live in West Hartford: I want good schools. I really want the best schools, and will be willing to pay a premium even if I don’t take advantage of the system (no kids yet). So, I want to know if my willingness is being taken advantage of or not, and whether we can do better as a town. I think if the tax burden were making it hard for me to afford living in town, or if I were on a fixed income, I would be more focused on the bottom line growth in the budget. So, I think it’s important that we acknowledge that difference if we’re going to come to some sort of consensus on a budget.

Enough meta-debate for now.

Let me get back to the test scores again. If we use the test scores as a proxy, we’re not in the top 5 as a district (and that’s just in our county). Like WH Forums, I wonder if this is a big deal or not. Certainly, I’d like for us to be much higher, but I don’t know whether the goal of being top 5 or number 1 makes sense for our town. Again, it matters whether the scores are a good proxy for educational results.

My take, which I think is pretty clear, is that the test scores cover two subject areas and that’s hardly the full measure of a student’s academic success or the quality of the education they’re receiving. For example, the WHPS executive summary highlights other, unmeasured differences. WHPS starts foreign language study in 3rd grade (kindergarten in some cases). They offer a gifted and talented program, which was important in my own education and an alternative high school program. Read the summary for others. These things don’t show up directly in test scores, even though they make for a broader education. These things are important to me. Therefore, I’m not sure the test scores serve as a good enough proxy for results.

This is worth having a wider conversation about in town, because we’re often speaking past each other when discussing the budget. Are we all going after the same goal? Do we agree on what makes a good public education system?

PS. local bloggers — if you don’t mind, could we all start using Google Docs or something like it when pulling together these type of spreadsheets? It can import Excel files if you’re more comfortable in the tools, and lets everyone play with the numbers rather than just look at a static file. I’d appreciate it.