Elementary school rankings, according to the Fraser Institute based on last the 2008 Foundation Skills Assessment:
North Okanagan
No. 120 – Coldstream
No. 131 – Beairsto, Vernon
No. 303 – Silver Star, Vernon
No. 517 – Armstrong, Armstrong
No. 546 – Ellison, Vernon
No. 567 – BX Elementary, Vernon
No. 600 – Vernon Christian School
No. 656 – Lavington
No. 675 – Highland Park, Armstrong
No. 694 – Harwood, Vernon
No. 730 – M.V. Beattie, Enderby
No. 822 – Okanagan Landing, Vernon
No. 833 – Hillview, Vernon
No. 925 – Alexis Park, Vernon
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Details of the schools can be found at Fraser Institute Website: (example below)
Report on Beairsto (Public)
| Gr 4 enrollment: 73 | |||||||
| ESL (%): 0.0 | Special needs (%): 1.5 | French Imm (%): 100.0 | |||||
| Actual rating vs predicted based | 2007-08 | Last 5 yrs | |||||
| on parents' avg. inc. of $58,000: 2.0 | Rank: | 131/952 | 213/839 | ||||
| Academic Performance | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | Trend |
| Gr 4 avg score: Reading | 515 | 0.26 | 0.05 | -0.18 | 497 | — |
| Writing | 540 | 533 | 503 | 515 | 571 | — |
| Numeracy | 525 | 0.09 | -0.07 | -0.07 | 488 | — |
| Gr 7 avg score: Reading | 540 | 0.41 | 0.29 | 0.17 | 548 | — |
| Writing | 537 | 572 | 511 | 529 | 705 | — |
| Numeracy | 523 | 0.25 | 0.20 | 0.03 | 531 | — |
| Gr 7 gender gap: Reading | F 56 | F 0.12 | F 0.17 | F 0.08 | F 12 | — |
| Numeracy | M 21 | M 0.06 | M 0.20 | M 0.28 | M 21 | — |
| Below expectations (%) | 10.6 | 7.9 | 15.2 | 13.3 | 13.9 | — |
| Tests not written (%) | n/a | n/a | 4.8 | 2.8 | 1.8 | n/a |
| Overall rating out of 10 | 6.9 | 7.9 | 6.5 | 6.8 | 7.8 | — |
2 comments:
With these ratings of Vernon schools, little wonder the Teacher's don't want to test their students.
Perhaps they protest too much.
Robert, it's clear you have little or no understanding of the controversy behind the FSA tests or the Fraser Institute's meaningless rankings. Let me try to enlighten you:
First of all, thanks for capitalizing the T in teachers; that shows either you really respect the profession, or you didn't pay close enough attention when you were in school.
Teachers actually DO want to test their students -- on a regular basis too! Valid, fair evaluative assessments are an integral part of the teaching-learning process.
The FSA, in and of itself, is not evil; its questions actually do follow math and language arts curricula.
The biggest problem teachers and parents have with FSA is that the government allows the Fraser Institute to publish the results to the general public, much of whom (like yourself) misinterpret the data.
The results DO NOT represent how well teachers are doing their job. Imagine the most skilled and talented teacher in the province moving from a private school in North Vancouver to a school in Northern BC where many its students are deemed at risk for addictions or violence. Do the lower scores represent a switch to poor teaching? I’ll let you make the rest of the connection.
With more and more parents becoming informed as to the problems with FSA in its current form, the Fraser Institute’s rankings have become even more meaningless. Increasing percentages of grades 4 and 7 students -- in protest with their parents -- are NOT writing the tests, thereby receiving a zero and having a significant effect on that school’s overall ranking. Perhaps there is a direct correlation between the lowest school’s ranking and its well-informed, politically active parents! Consider this: a school’s ranking may actually be based on as few as one student’s test scores! How valid is that data?
Before you slam teachers or schools, I challenge you to visit the “best” one on the list and the “worst” one on the list. My guess is you’d find hard-working teachers and smart kids in both. Then again, the choice to learn is yours…even great teachers can’t force their students to open their minds.
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