The Berkeley Experience
Berkeley, population about 104,000, is a city of diverse neighborhoods, rich or well-to-do, middle class and poor, and ethnically diverse. Home to a University of California, the town has many parents who are passionate about education and have approved extra funding for the schools.
Here’s how the high school breaks out:
Many at the top, many at the bottom or in the low-middle ranges.
Berkeley graduates about 15 percent of its seniors into a UC and it sends many students to the Ivy Leagues, Stanford, etc. These numbers indicate that the school has a top-notch prep program. www.mccormacks.com
The Berkeley district also has well-funded programs aimed at low achievers and middle students (Funding is relative to other schools. Many would argue that Berkeley and schools in general need more money.)
The conclusion: you can have academic excellence in a school that has many low-scoring students. www.mccormacks.com
Schools in Middle and Middle Plus
Many parents like these schools because they are located in “affordable” neighborhoods and offer programs for low, middle and high achievers.
These schools will have a fair number of clubs and extra- curricular activities, they will have their nerds and their jocks, and as stated, they will send many kids off to college, a few to the top universities, more to a Cal State or a community college. www.mccormacks.com
Many will have diverse student bodies, reflecting the migration of minorities to middle-income suburbs.
These schools will also have many parents who volunteer not so much in the class but at events — the snack bar at the football games, the chaperones at the dances. At back-to-school nights and teacher conferences, many parents show up. www.mccormacks.com
The drawbacks, in our opinion, to these schools: compared to really high-scoring schools, they may not be as academically motivated and this will vary from school to school.
You, the parent, may have to supply the intensity. www.mccormacks.com
Low-Scoring Schools
Who would send their kids to a low-scoring school? Yes, the poor have to; they don’t have a choice.
But many middle- and upper-middle parents also send their kids to low-scoring schools. www.mccormacks.com
In the 1990s, Silicon Valley exploded with jobs, many of them located in or near cities that were building very few homes. Some of these cities had low-income neighborhoods (low prices) with schools that scored low. After a while, the high-tech parents bought into the low-income neighborhoods and enrolled their kids in the schools. The scores rose (but not to the top) and the programs were changed to meet the needs of the higher-scoring students.
Many cities have transition neighborhoods that are moving up the scale and raising their scores. www.mccormacks.com
The Inland Schools
Coastal California, where most of the jobs are located, is running out of developable land and charging high prices for its housing. This has forced many parents into long commutes to rural counties where prices are cheaper.
In suburban counties on or near the coast, $600,000 or $700,000 might buy you a three-bedroom home, nothing fancy, that was built 50 to 60 years ago. www.mccormacks.com
Take the same dollars (or much less) and go inland — Riverside, San Bernardino, high-desert L.A., San Joaquin, Placer and Merced counties – and you can buy a suburban mansion — four to six bedrooms, two stories, walk-in closets, etc.
Many rural schools score low, the 10th to the 30th percentiles. www.mccormacks.com
Along comes a developer who plops down 400 single-family homes that are snapped up by the migrating middle class. Almost immediately, the scores shoot up by 10 or 20 points, sometimes higher.
Much depends on price, commuting distance and the jobs of buyers. Central California is attracting many “knowledge” workers from Silicon Valley. Some schools are now scoring well over the 50th percentile and a few in the 70s. www.mccormacks.com
Where high-tech firms have moved in-land (Sacramento and Placer counties) the scores are hitting the 90s.
In Southern California, Temecula (Riverside) and Chino Hills (San Bernardino) have some schools dancing in the 70 and 80th percentiles. www.mccormacks.com
Merced recently opened a UC that will attract many academics. Almost assuredly the scores in and near the city are going to ascend.
Not Just A Numbers Game
When you read the scores and the correlations, all this may seem a numbers game that can be neatly executed. www.mccormacks.com
Farm town with migrant workers or low-income city neighborhood has many children scoring in 20th percentile. In move professional families with kids scoring in 70th percentile. School develops programs for each group and all live happily ever after.
In reality, it is often socially difficult and expensive to break out the children by scores and provide separate programs for each group. Inevitably, many schools teach diverse students within the classroom. www.mccormacks.com
As for segmenting within the class, differentiated instruction, neither teachers nor schools are required to do this. Some don’t because these groupings often divide by ethnicity or simply because the teachers don’t have the time to fine-tune the class.
The same for gifted classes, which irritate many parents whose kids score about the middle. With some justification, they see their kids being excluded from the college track. The typical gifted program is a compromise that puts these kids in their own classes for a few hours a week. www.mccormacks.com
Parents of gifted students believe, usually strongly, that their children should be allowed to work to the level of their abilities, a principle that surfaces in many arguments over California education.
High schools will frequently disagree on whether to open honors classes to all students or just to the top scorers? And if all students, should the curriculum be changed to make it easier for them? www.mccormacks.com
Money is frequently a problem. The school cannot fund everything so it has to make difficult decisions over programs.
If a school has many low-scoring children and a small number of high-scoring kids, then perhaps it should concentrate on remedial and basic classes. www.mccormacks.com
We cited Berkeley earlier as an example of how a school can field diverse programs. What we didn’t say is that Berkeley has had bitter arguments over its programs and that many parents enroll their children, especially in the younger years, in private schools.
Parental Choices
If you have the money, you probably don’t have to compromise on house or neighborhood. www.mccormacks.com
If you don’t have the money, you have to compromise and perhaps the most important thing is to realize that you are making a compromise and that you have choices.
Some high-scoring districts will have “affordable” streets where the homes are old and modest. You give up a something on the house side for academic schools and often a short commute. www.mccormacks.com
Many mid-scoring and even low-scoring districts have schools that score high. You buy in the “affordable” side of town and enroll your kids in the higher-scoring schools.
Often the compromise will be difficult because you will have to balance schools against other important elements — commuting distance, home quality and especially price. www.mccormacks.com
Nonetheless, look at the scores and try to figure out the best compromise. See School Rankings and Choosing A School .
No matter what the school or its scores, do the values thing: make the open houses, see that the homework gets done, etc. It can make a world of difference. See School Advice .
Other Choices
California is constantly arguing about pacing and programs. And constantly changing or tinkering with programs, often to satisfy parents who want their children to move at a faster pace. www.mccormacks.com
We are going to present just one configuration — the exam school — and for more information refer you to Choosing A School .
Some of these alternatives are hidden or poorly presented. You have to dig out the information. Often the scores will tip you off to the programs. www.mccormacks.com
Exam Schools
These schools admit by competitive exam and include Whitney High in Los Angeles, the highest scoring in the state (Math SAT the 680s), and Lowell High in San Francisco (Math SAT the 640s). This group also takes in a small number of elementary schools that restrict admissions to gifted kids.
Whitney High graduates fewer than 200 students a year. Lowell graduates about 650 a year and is a major force in how San Francisco educates its children. In some years, among public schools in San Francisco, Lowell accounts for about 40 percent of all the students accepted into a UC. www.mccormacks.com
Exam schools don’t have assigned attendance zones and for that reason say nothing about the social conditions of their immediate neighborhoods.
They also introduce uncertainty into school choice because they do not guarantee seats to the local children.
The exam schools exemplify the principle that students should be allowed to learn as fast they can. www.mccormacks.com
Gifted programs vary by district, often depending on the energy of parents. Some schools cluster the gifted kids in their own classes for most of the school day and mix them with other students in sports, band and other general activities.
See Charter Schools, Alternative Schools, Magnet Schools in Choosing A School .
See also Private Schools .
