| Vol. XLIII, No.1 | Winter 1998 |
Fairfax County Public Schools "Community Accountability Report"- What's Missing?
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Since 1996, the Fairfax County Public Schools system has published an annual "Community Accountability Report" entitled Good Schools . . .Good for Everyone. Former school superintendent, Dr. Robert R. Spillane, and then school board chairman, Kristen J. Amundson, stated in the 1996 report that its purpose was to show that, "Our students achieve at very high levels, and the school system operates at a very low cost compared to other school systems in the region."
However, the three reports published since 1996 show neither trends in per-student spending nor average Fairfax County Public Schools SAT percentiles.
While Fairfax County Public Schools do cost less per student than neighboring school systems, Fairfax per-student costs, adjusted for inflation, increased 86% since 1975. The increase, including inflation is 490%. Costs include both operating budget and school debt service.
The school system annually reports its average SAT scores, which are about 80 points above the national average. However, the school system never reports its average SAT percentile. As the accompanying SAT graph shows, the average Fairfax County Public Schools senior scores at the 64th percentile.
Another statistic missing from the "Community Accountability Report" is the percentage of Fairfax County seniors who attend four-year colleges but fail to graduate. Nationally, about 50% of high school seniors who attend four-year colleges never graduate from college. It appears that this is also true for Fairfax County students.
A December 1994, Fairfax County Public Schools report entitled "Securing Our Students' Future in a High-Tech Global Economy" inaugurated the Professional/Technical Studies program to "dramatically redesign" the curriculum by merging vocational and academic tracks. Page 1 of this report states, "Only 55 percent of those Virginia students who attend a four-year college actually graduate." That this statistic was used to justify a major curriculum change in Fairfax County suggests that the statistic applies to Fairfax County.
Opponents of tax credits for private school tuition and contributions claim that diverting money from public schools jeopardizes the education of minorities. Do these critics believe that minorities are getting a quality education in public schools? The accompanying graph shows that the average SAT percentile for Hispanic seniors is below the 50th percentile and is below the 40th percentile for African Americans. In the 1997 report, Dr. Spillane specifically stated, "Achievement is high for students of all ethnic groups, . . . "
The new superintendent, Dr. Daniel A. Domenech, himself an Hispanic, makes no such claim in his 1998-99 report. On the contrary, believes that he must increase SAT scores. According to a September 16, 1998, Washington Post article ("Schools Strive to Raise Test Scores of Minorities") "Dr. Domenech says his goal is to eliminate the racial gap in SAT scores within five years."
However, the school board has not adopted Dr. Domenech's five-year goal. The official school board goal is that "the gap between minority and majority students' [SAT] scores will narrow by 10 percent" and "the percentage of students scoring above the national average on both the verbal and mathematic SAT will exceed the previous year's percentage."
These are weak goals. There's no commitment to close the minority achievement gap, and if the percent of students scoring above average increases but by a negligible amount, the school board can still claim success on the second goal. Furthermore the school administration has provided no historical data on the percent of students scoring above average, so there is nothing with which to compare future results.
The "Community Accountability Report" notwithstanding, the school board is still avoiding accountability by withholding important statistics and setting timid goals. As the accompanying graphs show, the school system has increased spending, not achievement.
by Arthur Purves
In February 1997, the school board approved a $9 million computerized student information system. One would hope that computerization would lead to a smaller administrative staff. Not so.
On November 20, 1998, the school board received a Phase I report, "Workload and Classification Study of Office-Based Positions," by MGT of America. This is the company that in 1997 performed a $500,000 management analysis of the school system and concluded that Fairfax County had one of the best managed school systems in the country.
MGT's report recommends an increase of about 300 new office positions at a cost of about $8 million.
By Arthur Purves