Posted by
Arrow on Sunday, September 03, 2006 9:11:56 PM
Bad news became good news where I come from. But then-- bad news again.
The USA Today announced the results from SAT testing on Tuesday.
National average scores for the SAT college entrance exam fell 7 points — the biggest drop in 31 years — for the high school class of 2006, the first to take the new version of the test.
Got that? Six years into No Child Left Behind, driving a 65% increase in Department of Education K-12 spending since 2001 to an unimaginable $23,615,510,000 (projected 2006). And-- inclusive of all Federal agencies-- an incredible $66,000,000,000 is spent on K-12 education. But, alas, SAT scores are down. Imagine that.
This national news was followed by a press release from the NC State Board of Education which cheered the fact that the NC scores fell at a smaller rate than those nationally, allowing them to harp that “North Carolina students continued to close the gap between the state and the national average…” And closing that gap allows the state to boast of placing only 36th nationally. Oh, and this is coupled with the stirring news that a whopping 3% of NC students took AP tests. Surely a sign-- Dewey smiles!
More fun was to be had in Mecklenburg County, home to Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. Nationally known as a result of eye-popping litigation a few years back when parents sued to escape busing and won (psst! was it racism?), then more recently mired in controversy around the system’s performance, the Charlotte Observer reports:
Overall, North Carolina's mean SAT score was 1008, a two-point drop. But the state moved closer to the national average of 1021 and now ranks 36th.
South Carolina's 985 was an eight-point decrease. The S.C. totals for reading and math bested only Washington, D.C. When writing was added, the state also topped Hawaii.
Several schools in CMS and the region topped state averages. And the top 10 percent in CMS outscored their peers in North Carolina and across the country.
See, those of us in NC, and particularly Charlotte, always have an out since we share that southern border with South Carolina. Wasn’t it interesting to see their secretary squirm as John Stossel’s ‘Stupid in America’ probed the failure of government schools there? Why even the Governor was expected to abandon the public school system.
It’s way past time, people. School choice is a must. And not only for the disadvantaged or those where the walls are literally coming down. But for every parent.