Ratings rankle school officials

COEUR d’ALENE — A quick glance at the 2016 U.S. News and World Report High School Rankings might give the appearance that some Kootenai County schools are becoming lackadaisical about academic achievement.

That is not the case, said school officials who ranged from skeptical to upset about the magazine’s ratings.

Only two schools in the county earned national recognition in the publication, which was released online this month, and none of them were ranked among the best in the state. Education officials throughout the county told The Press there are a wide variety of reasons a school would earn below-average marks, appear on the list without any marks, or not even appear in the database at all.

U.S. News and World Report began compiling and publishing high school rankings in 2007 with the goal of providing “a clear, unbiased picture of how well public schools serve all of their students in preparing them to demonstrate proficiency in basic skills as well as readiness for college-level work.” According to its website, the media organization works with a nonprofit social science research firm, RTI International, to create a methodology of ranking based on four factors: basic data from the U.S. Department of Education, Advanced Placement test data, International Baccalaureate test data, and each high school’s statewide test results and graduation rates.

For the current iteration of the rankings, U.S. News and World Report used information gathered from the 2013-14 school year.

Coeur d’Alene Charter Academy, a school that previously appeared in the database as one of the top 50 high schools in the nation, was not included in the database. Principal Dan Nicklay told The Press it is the second year in a row the school was not included.

“I have spoken with people at the state board of education, at U.S. News and the firm that does their data collection,” he added. “No one can tell me where we went — it’s maddening to me.”

Nicklay said he believes when the school transferred its charter to the state charter commission two years ago, something occurred that caused the school to be removed from state and national databases.

Robert Morse, chief data strategist at U.S. News, confirmed a portion of Nicklay’s theory when he told The Press the company uses data from the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics when compiling rankings.

“For the 2013-14 academic year, the Common Core of Data from NCES did not include data points for Coeur d’Alene Charter Academy in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho,” Morse said. “As a result, U.S. News was unable to include the school on our website or in our rankings.”

The Press attempted to contact the U.S. Department of Education multiple times without a reply. NCES obtains its data from state departments of education.

“It’s a snapshot of what we all know and fear about bureaucracy; people become so specialized and focused on the one tiny part of the machine that is theirs that they don’t have a clue what the big picture looks like,” Nicklay said.

Removal from the database, he added, could have real ramifications for the school. Unlike traditional public schools, charter schools must attract students to the campus.

“I can’t tell you how many calls we’ve gotten in the past from somebody who said they saw we were No. 1 in the state and they’d like to come see our school,” Nicklay said. “I still say we are one of the top 50 schools in the country because I know we are in that range regardless of whether it ends up in print.”

Nicklay added that he hopes the publication will acknowledge the misstep and at least put the school on its website.

Both of the high schools in the Lakeland Joint School District earned bronze awards — given to high-performing schools based on state exam performance — in the U.S. News rankings. Superintendent Brad Murray told The Press it’s important to celebrate that honor, but a deeper dive into the criteria is also necessary.

“They’re using the AP test for the top schools and in a smaller school district like ours with limited resources we can only choose certain things,” Murray said. “Some schools are going to do IB and AP and dual credit. We don’t have all the resources to pull something like that off. We stay pretty focused on our mission and vision.”

Lakeland High School, for example, recently began focusing heavily on offering its students the opportunity to take dual enrollment classes. Approximately 27 college credits can be obtained through the classes, Murray said.

“We have kids who have just about completed an AA degree out of high school without ever leaving campus,” Murray said. “But that wouldn’t show up in this report because they’re focused on AP classes.”

Meeting the needs of the district’s students and ensuring they are prepared for college will always be the focus, he added.

“We’re comfortable and confident in what we do,” Murray said. “The opportunities our small little district provides are amazing.”

Neither of the high schools in the Coeur d’Alene School District received state rankings in the publication. Coeur d’Alene High School was listed as “near Idaho average” in terms of college readiness, and Lake City High School was listed as “below average.”

Coeur d’Alene School District Superintendent Matt Handelman told The Press in an email that, although they would like to be highly ranked by any organization’s metrics, the work of the district involves the “continuous process of providing the best learning experience” possible to all of its students.

“I can't say that our district looks at the rankings closely, but rather we spend time analyzing the data we do have about our students and our programs in order to get better at what we do every day,” he wrote.

Handelman used standardized test scores, one of the primary metrics of the U.S. News list, as an example of this philosophy. He said the district uses those scores as a baseline for improvement and, while they may be honored to receive high marks, the quest for improvement never ceases.

Some parents, according to Handelman, “shop” for schools based on test scores and rankings. Others, he added, recognize that test scores alone do not paint a complete picture of a school.

“While I'm sure U.S. News' list of the best colleges influences where many parents and students eventually apply and go to college, I do not believe that most families would be moving to an area in order to attend a specific high school,” Handelman wrote. “Such selection might happen locally, but my best professional judgment is that people here locally have opinions about their options for local high schools, and would not need U.S. News and World Report to guide them.”

Although Post Falls High School is listed in the U.S. News database, there are no rankings or college readiness placement associated with the school.

Post Falls School District Superintendent Jerry Keane said there are myriad organizations that rank schools based on a variety of metrics. Some, he added, are more valid than others.

“What most of the rankings do not consider is the social economic status of students, and other measures that reflect the human side of schools,” Keane said.

Upon examining the U.S. News metrics, Keane said that one of the key ways schools are ranked is by the number of students passing advanced placement tests. Post Falls schools do not participate in the advanced placement program, he said.

“Our students enroll in dual credit classes with the University of Idaho and North Idaho College,” Keane said. “Last year our students received over 900 college credits.”

Keane also called into question the company’s use of class size when creating its rankings. Comparing rural schools to large high schools, he said, “frankly is not valid as a measurement of the quality of a school.”

“Every larger high school has larger class sizes than all of the small rural high schools,” Keane added. “Apples to oranges.”