EDITORIAL: RI School Report Cards Are Out, and the Numbers Are Cringeworthy

On Friday afternoon at 3:22 PM, the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE) sent out a press release about Rhode Island schools' latest performance -- and "accountability."

In the public relations world, this is known as a “Friday afternoon dump.” And, what a dump it was.

Sending out the press release on Friday, RIDE hoped that no one would notice or that it is too late in the week to draw attention.

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GoLocal examined the scores and published a review of the performance of the state’s schools.

There was little good news. For parents who live in Barrington, they can claim that they were the “best of the worst.”  But even in Rhode Island’s most affluent community, 36.8% of its students did not achieve proficiency in math and 37.3% in science.

That was the good news.

 

Horrifying Numbers

In contrast, the worst of the worst continues to be simply the state's biggest embarrassment — the state-run Central Falls School Department.

Here are the Central Falls district scores:

English Language Arts Proficiency: 6% of students are meeting expectations, none are exceeding expectations

Math Proficiency: 4% of students are meeting expectations, none are exceeding expectations

Science Proficiency: 6.2% of students are meeting expectations, and of that number, about a third (2.1%) are exceeding expectations.

 

And if those numbers are not harrowing enough — at Central Falls Middle School, the proficiency in math is 1%, and if our math is correct, then 99% are not proficient.

Central Falls Middle School is not the only middle school in Rhode Island, with nearly no children able to meet the standard for basic math.

Providence’s Del Sesto Middle School is 1.8% proficient in math.

Roger Williams Middle School in Providence is 1.2% proficient in math.

And, on and on.

Blisteringly cruel is that future jobs are math-driven - computer programmers, user experience designers, and so on.

We seem to be still training students for agrarian or working in the mill — neither has been exactly a growth industry in the northeast in the last century (or two).

 

Is Money the Factor? Not What the Numbers Show

If we think this is an issue that can be solved by money, performance versus per-pupil spending does not show a correlation, even in low-income communities versus other low-income communities. 

Barrington spends just over $16,000, and Westerly spends more than $25,000 per pupil.

Dollars are a factor, but it is difficult to find a district-versus-district correlation between spending and performance.

 

The Biggest Problem

This past week, Speaker of the House Joe Shekarchi announced his top priorities for 2023 -- affordable housing, a potential $50 million state investment for a life science and biotechnology center, and putting Rhode Island on a "sustainable economic path." In a second breath, the Speaker mentioned shoreline access and education. 

Guess what, when you have a good job, you have a fighting chance to buy a house and build wealth. 

Let's kick the can some more -- why not, because in Central Falls and some Providence Middle Schools, it is almost statistically impossible to have a lower performance in math. 

But it looks like we will try.