According to Prince William County Schools Communications Director Phil Kavits, the U.S. News & World Report index of top U.S. high schools under represents the actual success of Prince William County Schools.
“We honestly couldn’t understand why some of our schools were not on the top 50 schools in Virginia,” Kavits said.
Kavits noticed that Prince William’s Osbourn Park High School in Manassas scored higher than Annandale High School in Fairfax on all accounts on the index, except class size. However, whereas Annandale was ranked 27th in Virginia, and received a silver medal, Osbourn Park neither made the top 51 list, nor received even a bronze medal.
Osbourn Park High School
Manassas, Prince William County Public Schools
Medal: none Virginia ranked: unranked National Rank: none
College Readiness- 49.6 Student/teacher Ratio- 20:1 Math Prof.- 3.2 Reading Prof.- 3.6
Annandale High School
Annandale, Fairfax County Public Schools
Medal: Silver Virginia Ranking: 27 National Rank: 649
College Readiness- 41.1 Student/Teacher Ratio- 18:1 Math Prof.- 3.1 Reading Prof.- 3.4
Kavit’s curiosity into the matter prompted him to contact U.S. News directly and speak with someone who understood the formula- someone who was surprised a representative of a single district was able to get him on the phone.
“How did you get to me?” Kavits said, the man asked him.
Once in contact, the staff member at U.S. News directed Kavits to download a lengthy PDF file detailing their formula, and then walked him through their analytics.
With a more comprehensive understanding of their ranking system, Kavits concluded that there were at three factors that kept Prince William Schools from receiving gold, silver or bronze medal, and consequently also kept them off the publication’s top 51 list of Virginia’s Best High Schools.
The most evident factor was class size, which played a huge role in the equation U.S. News applied (as Bristow Beat recognized in our prior article on high school rankings.) Even if students within the classes perform on par with other schools, the overall scores drop due to high classes sizes.
Kavits recognized this, saying, “We are definitely taking a big hit because of the size of the classrooms."
However, he did not believe that class size was an accurate measure of a school’s progress or ability to effectively educate its students, especially when those same schools are producing high test scores.
“What we’re saying is: yes, we’re not able to invest as much per student, but we’re delivering a pretty big bang for the buck,” Kavits said.
Another factor, which is less obvious upon first investigation, is interaction between test scores and disadvantaged populations. Schools earn more points towards medals and college readiness, when test scores are high in correlation with a high percentage of economically disadvantaged students.
Thus, Battlefield High School in Haymarket, which has high college readiness scores of 41.6 and math and reading scores of 3.2 and 3.5 respectively, is penalized since only 13 percent of its students are economically disadvantaged. Add to that high student/teacher ratios of 21:1, and Battlefield receives no ranking and no medals, despite high scores.
U.S. News and World Report also under values achievements in schools that focus on college readiness through their specialty programs. While the index, counts Advanced Placement (AP) or International Baccalaureate (IB) tests, it does not count both per given school. In addition, it does not include Cambridge tests at all in its equation.
As a result, U.S. News calculated the number Stonewall Jackson High School who took IB exams as part of their college readiness score, but not the students who took AP exams.
Said Stonewall Jackson Principal Richard Nichols, “The data from US News and World Report is somewhat misleading. They excluded AP for Stonewall," said Nichols. He reports that albeit a comparatively smaller number, " We administered over 200 AP exams last year.”
As for Brentsville District High School in Nokesville, there many students take Cambridge exams, but those tests were not included in the college readiness index, so that school was compared on the basis of only their AP tests, even though it is a Cambridge specialty school.
While, the U.S. News and World Report high school index does not reflect particularly well on Prince William Schools, Kavits said that is not to diminish its usefulness as one measure of school success. He said it can be useful to parents when it is considered in context, alongside other measure, and when people have a general understanding of how the equation works.
Kavits just hopes people will take a closer look to see that the scores does not necessarily tells the entire story of a school’s achievement.
“We’re very proud at the performance of these schools,” said Kavits. “There are some great stories as far as what these schools are accomplishing.”
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