Chicago’s Urban Prep Does It Again: 100 Percent College Acceptance

[Higher Tech]

One of the reasons they have a 100% acceptance rate for seniors is that their attrition rate is incredibly high. They lost almost 1/3 of their initial class from freshmen year to graduation, which is a massive loss. They force the lower performers out. This makes their actual graduation rate actually 6 points lower than the district average, which is not an achievement.

The other reason is that they refuse to graduate people who aren't accepted into a college, which naturally results in a perfect graduation/acceptance correlation. They can do this since they are a charter that sets their own requirements.

It's worth noting that their Chicago comp exam results are at 15%, which are far lower than the Chicago average of 23%. That means those that graduated barely made the cut, and that they struggled through HS, meaning they will almost certainly struggle through college and have a high dropout rate, which is the established patten of such students.

This is what happens when you focus on fluffing stats and leaving kids behind instead of on education.

If this is true, then this all really kinda blows.

 

[theworldismine13]

If this is true, then this all really kinda blows.

its not true, he got that info from liberal attacks on charter schools, its a pathetic attack

for example, the 1/3 figure is stupid, because it means the school has a 70% graduation rate, which isnt great but its decent considering the population is randomly selected from students from the hood, but they use that 1/3 like its the most awful thing in the world

its disgusting, liberals are putting their ideology ahead of school reform and innovation

 

[The Real]

its not true, he got that info from liberal attacks on charter schools, its a pathetic attack

for example, the 1/3 figure is stupid, because it means the school has a 70% graduation rate, which isnt great but its decent considering the population is randomly selected from students from the hood, but they use that 1/3 like its the most awful thing in the world

its disgusting, liberals are putting their ideology ahead of school reform and innovation

These points were already addressed.

First, I was wrong about the 1/3 figure. The attrition rate is actually almost 50%, which is much worse.

Second, these aren't random kids "from the hood." The school uses a lottery process, and anyone who lives in Chicago can apply, as you can check on the website. There's no bias whatsoever towards accepting kids "from the hood." You just got hyped cause like all schools, they picked the Black kids from the hood for their photo ops. That's also why it makes no sense whatsoever to compare its performance to those of "neighborhood schools that Urban Prep kids would normally attend"- there is no such set of normal schools, since they are from everywhere in the city and the public schools they would have attended vary widely. That was either disingenuous or ignorant on the part of the author you cited. My guess, since she didn't cite her info, is that she compared Urban Prep to the lowest performance public schools, which would obviously be dishonest.

The population of students is a random representation of Chicago demographics, and thus can be credibly compared only to the performance of the average public school in the district, since when averaged, their pool is similarly an aggregate of kids from all over the city. And as I stated at the outset, when compared that way, Urban Prep does worse on attrition and worse on standardized test scores.

 

[theworldismine13]

These points were already addressed.

First, I was wrong about the 1/3 figure. The attrition rate is actually almost 50%, which is much worse.

Second, these aren't random kids "from the hood." The school uses a lottery process, and anyone who lives in Chicago can apply. There's no bias whatsoever towards accepting kids "from the hood." You just got hyped cause you went on their website, and like all schools, they picked the hood kids for the photo ops. The population is a random representation of Chicago demographics, and thus can be credibly compared to the average performance of public schools in the district, since their pool is similarly an aggregate of kids from all over the city. And as I stated at the outset, when compared that way, Urban Prep does worse on attrition and worse on standardized test scores.

where are you getting the 50% figure from? and it doesnt matter if you correct it anyways(which you havent until you provide a source) its the fact that you tried to use 1/3 as a negative, which is demonic behavior

the population is 100 percent african american, 100% male, 84% are low income and 2 percent are homeless Urban Prep Chtr Academy Englewood High School -- Chicago Tribune 2013 Illinois School Report Cards how can you say they are representative of chicago

im obviously for high standards and black domination so i think at the end of the day urban prep is not fully working until the students are competing at the highest academic levels but relative to the demographic does at regular public school, urban prep is way better and your attacks on it are pathetic

 

[The Real]

where are you getting the 50% figure from? and it doesnt matter if you correct it anyways(which you havent until you provide a source) its the fact that you tried to use 1/3 as a negative, which is demonic behavior

the population is 100 percent african american, 100% male, 84% are low income and 2 percent are homeless Urban Prep Chtr Academy Englewood High School -- Chicago Tribune 2013 Illinois School Report Cards how can you say they are representative of chicago

im obviously for high standards and black domination so i think at the end of the day urban prep is not fully working until the students are competing at the highest academic levels but relative to the demographic does at regular public school, urban prep is way better and your attacks on it are pathetic

The citation for the attrition rate was posted elsewhere in this thread by more than one poster.

I don't think they're representative of Chicago's people, but representative of Chicago public school districts. The argument in the article you linked was that those kids would be doing worse at the schools they would normally attend, but again, public school efficacy varies widely. There's no such thing as a "low-income public school." There are only worse and better ones, and their quality affects how well low-income students do in them.

 

[theworldismine13]

The citation for the attrition rate was posted elsewhere in this thread by more than one poster.

I don't think they're representative of Chicago's people, but representative of Chicago public school districts. The argument in the article you linked was that those kids would be doing worse at the schools they would normally attend, but again, public school efficacy varies widely. There's no such thing as a "low-income public school." There are only worse and better ones, and their quality affects how well low-income students do in them.

lol, so a 100 percent black, 100 percent male, about 85 percent low income and 2 percent homeless is representative of chicago?..........ok

i havent seen that link that says 50%, so feel free to post it and bottom line is you got busted engaging in demonic behavior

 

[theworldismine13]

Educating Beyond Poverty
Tim King: Educating Beyond Poverty

One of the most baffling and counterproductive elements of school reform debates is when educators of different ideological persuasions look to diminish the accomplishments of public schools that are succeeding with disadvantaged students.

Recently, in the New York Times and Education Week, education historian Diane Ravitch criticized the performance of several schools that President Barack Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan praised for improving achievement and attainment among low-income students. Ravitch and a number of like-minded critics seem intent on demonstrating that schools cannot overcome the burdens of poverty.

As the founder of Urban Prep Academies, operator of one of the schools that Ravitch criticized, I respectfully disagree.

Every member of the first and second graduating classes at Urban Prep gained admission to a four-year college. Across our network of three schools, students are African-American males and admitted via a non-selective lottery; on average, about 85 percent qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, 15 percent have special needs, and over 85 percent enter high school reading below grade level.

Instead of examining the programs and supports we have in place at Urban Prep that made our achievements possible, Ravitch and other critics minimize the perfect college acceptance record of our graduates. They cite the number of students who left the school between 9th grade and 12th grade and misrepresent our 11th grade students' performance on standardized tests. These critics should be comparing apples-to-apples; not apples-to-grapefruits.

Rather than paralleling our students' performance to children from all across Chicago, let's examine how Urban Prep students stack up against their peers: other African-American males in non-selective public high schools.

The Black male high school drop-out rate in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is almost 60 percent -- nearly double the attrition rate at Urban Prep. We credit our ability to keep significantly more students than other schools to our engaging and unique positive school culture.

Ravitch cites a blogger's reporting that "only 17 percent passed state tests, compared to 64 percent in the low-performing Chicago public school district." Neither Ravitch nor the blogger she credits managed to get their facts straight; the district average on the 11th grade state test for the percent of students meeting/exceeding state standards is 29 percent, not 64 percent. And again, when one compares our students to their peers, our students do better--especially when you consider growth. On the English section of the state test, for example, 24.6 percent of our students are meeting or exceeding the state standards (90 percent of this class was reading below grade level when they started at Urban Prep), whereas for Black boys, the city-wide rate is just 16.3 percent and only 3.4 percent in our neighboring traditional public school.

To be sure, the test scores of our students still have plenty of room for improvement. But Ravitch implies that low test scores mean that our perfect college acceptance record doesn't matter. Our graduates, she and others suggest, won't succeed in college and so our school is not really making a big difference. Yet the fact is that our graduates are already succeeding in four-year colleges: roughly 80 percent of Urban Prep's 2010 graduates who went to college completed their first year. That is an impressive accomplishment, given that it's the same first-year retention rate as national averages reported by the College Board for students of all races, genders, income levels and high school types (i.e., public and private).

Our graduates' rate of college attendance makes a difference in their own lives and in the vitality of their communities. By conservative estimates, our first graduating class alone is projected to increase the total number of African-American male 9th graders in CPS who earn a college degree by as much as 12 percent. If subsequent graduating classes at our three schools have the same success with college admission and matriculation as our first class, Urban Prep could increase the number of Black boys starting as CPS freshmen who will earn a college degree by as much as 40 percent.

Even with these levels of achievement, we still work hard at getting better. And we welcome advice, counsel and constructive criticism from others interested in improving educational outcomes for our students. But there is a big difference between examining data to identify where schools should improve and misusing numbers in an effort to discredit real achievement or promote a political agenda.

At the heart of Ravitch's claim is a belief in the limitations of what good schools can accomplish with disadvantaged students; she no longer seems to believe in the transformative power of education. Ravitch argues that the efforts of the students, staff, and faculty at Urban Prep and other schools are largely fruitless until society eliminates the family and financial hardships of our students. While I agree that those issues matter, my years as an educator have taught me that the economic conditions of children and families should not be used as an excuse for failure. Poverty is not destiny. That's a lesson every school should teach, every educator should believe, and every student has a right to learn.

 

[Insensitive]

@The Real stomping on magic pills

Such ruthless efficiency.

Fail half of the kids out of your school to arbitrarily inflate
your numbers only to get praised by idiots brehs.

I'm happy black kids are going to college but

 

[theworldismine13]

@The Real stomping on magic pills

Such ruthless efficiency.

Fail half of the kids out of your school to arbitrarily inflate
your numbers only to get praised by idiots brehs.

I'm happy black kids are going to college but

the real has already been exposed to be engaging in demonic behavior and making up numbers

 

[Figdcotton]

commercial break. i don't make threads and this is the closest thread ..

negro lost a mil and a car



he said deispen

That's crazy yo

 

[Hiphoplives4eva]

@The Real stomping on magic pills

Such ruthless efficiency.

Fail half of the kids out of your school to arbitrarily inflate
your numbers only to get praised by idiots brehs.

I'm happy black kids are going to college but

Have you seen the attrition rate for regular Chicago public schools? Or are you attacking without facts like thereal?

 

[theworldismine13]

Let the record show how motherfukers who love to call me mean names in other threads couldn't stand up and defend a black man opening up a black school that sends black males to college

At the drop of dime these motherfukers will write an essay about what the white man needs to do and how the white man needs to address the issues, the notion of a black man addressing black issues never occurs to them

 

[h2o_proof]

I need to know the number of 9th grade students year one compared to the number of 12th grade students year 4 each year in order to determine how I feel about this because if the numbers are relatively comparable this is good. Means they are replacing non-college bound students with college bound students thereby still holding true to their promise at an acceptable rate. Otherwise there are some operating inefficiencies.

 

[theworldismine13]

I need to know the number of 9th grade students year one compared to the number of 12th grade students year 4 each year in order to determine how I feel about this because if the numbers are relatively comparable this is good. Means they are replacing non-college bound students with college bound students thereby still holding true to their promise at an acceptable rate. Otherwise there are some operating inefficiencies.

The real already explained the numbers it's just that he did it in a demonic manner

About 1/3 don't make it, so that means the school has a 70% graduation rate, so in other words a school which is all black everything, all hood everything is sending students straight to college with a 70 percent success rate

Instead of trying to expand this and replicate this success some people want to shut it down

 

[alybaba]

Watching posters struggle with cognitive dissonance is what makes this forum so much fun.