Providence High Schools at the Bottom: RI’s Top High Schools 2012

Monday, May 14, 2012

Dan McGowan, GoLocalProv News Editor

 

In the days leading up to the Providence School Board announcing a new Superintendent of schools last week, several individuals close to the search talked about the need for continuity in a school district that has been decimated by leadership turnover over the last decade.

They got their wish.

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Providence's Mount Pleasant High School ranked #51 for two years in a row. The district includes the 7 worst schools in the state.

Dr. Susan Lusi, who had served as interim head of schools since last July and quickly earned the respect of administrators and teachers throughout the district, was awarded the permanent position over an outside candidate who some feared would immediately clash with the teachers union.

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Her task: Reform a school district that includes the seven worst high schools in the state while also continuing to improve relationships with educators still hesitant to trust city leadership after a decision to hand every teacher a pink slip in 2011.

“Since coming to the Providence School Department, Dr. Lusi has brought stability, professional expertise, and a collaborative spirit that has served this district well,” said Providence School Board President Keith A. Oliveira. “Dr. Lusi is an exceptional education administrator and we are fortunate to have her continue the work she has started towards improving the quality of our schools and increasing the achievement level of our students.”

Seven Worst Schools in the State

But now that she’s built a foundation, will real results follow?

At Mount Pleasant High School, which ranked last in the state for the second consecutive year, proficiency in writing actually dropped from 19 percent in 2011 to just 12 percent in 2012. The school’s four-year graduation rate: 56.3 percent.

For each member of the bottom seven (Mount Pleasant, Cooley, Hope Information Technology, Central Alvarez, Providence Academy of International Studies and Hope Arts) math proficiency sits below five percent. The poor performing Providence schools aren’t alone when it comes to struggles in math. At Classical, the crown jewel of Providence schools and #10 in GoLocalProv’s rankings, just 48 percent of students are proficient in math.

SAT scores are another area where the city’s bottom schools struggle. All seven hovered around a combined 1100 in verbal, math and writing. By comparison, the average University of Rhode Island freshman this school year scored 1670 on the test.

Gist: Performance Doesn’t Always Correlate with Income

Still, while the suburban schools continue to round up to top potion of the rankings, Education Commissioner Deborah Gist said she disagrees with the premise that the best schools always come from the suburbs and the worst ones always come from the city.

“Though rankings based on absolute performance do tend to correlate with the relative wealth of the school district, rankings based on other factors, such as student growth, do not necessarily correlate with income levels,” Gist said.

Gist said RIDE plans to release a new “Growth Model Visualization Tool” for elementary and middle schools this week that will track the percentage of students who attained proficiency on the state assessments as well as how much progress students have made, relative to their academic peers, from one year’s assessment to the next. She noted that schools with relatively low achievement levels are “making significant progress on student growth.”

Gist cautioned that because there are so many different ways to measure, rankings can be misleading. At the same time, she said, the public does have a right to know which schools are high performing and which ones are in need of improvement.

“We believe the public should have access to good data on school performance and student achievement so that families can make wise decisions about the education of their children and so that all members of the community have up-to-date information about the public schools that we support with our tax dollars,” Gist said. “We also believe educators should have access to good data on school performance and student achievement so that they use data to make wise decisions about improving teaching and learning in their school.”

Mayor Supports Lusi

And in a city like Providence, anything that can move the needle when it comes to performance is welcome.

But if anyone can transform the struggling schools, it’s Lusi, according to Mayor Angel Taveras.

“Dr. Lusi has provided steady and inspiring leadership this year in her role as Interim Superintendent,” he said. “Her honest and forthright approach to working with principals, teachers, the School Board and other partners has created an atmosphere of trust and respect that is vital to our efforts to improve education in Providence. I look forward to working closely with Dr. Lusi to provide every child in Providence with the education he or she deserves and to make the Providence Public Schools the best urban school district in America.”

 

For a printable version of RI's Top High Schools 2012, with the full chart of rankings and summaries of key articles, Download PDF

 

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