Yesterday, McHenry County Blog published the percentage of incoming freshmen at McHenry County College require remedial math classes.
The best high school district was Huntley’s at 46% needing help to be able to take a college course.
Today, we look at the situation with regard to English.
It’s much better.
The average is only 11%.
So, take a look at the figures for each of the high school districts in McHenry County College District 528:
Previously, I typed out the results math results so people could find them with an internet search engine. Today, we’ll do the same for preparation for college English, except going from best to worst.
- Alden-Hebron – 0%
- Richmond-Burton – 6%
- Marengo – 8%
- Johnsburg – 9%
- McHenry – 11%
- Crystal Lake, Cary-Grove – 11%
- Woodstock – 14%
- Huntley – 20%
- Harvard – 38%
Again, explanations are welcomed in the comment section.
So….these statistics don’t really mean much, do they? They already exclude kids who chose to go to OTHER colleges, and focus on one school only, clearly by someone who has a specific point to make.
Why not instead report overall scores for the entire graduating class? Why focus on a smaller population who chose a junior college (for many different reasons) rather than a 4 year college?
Where are the additional details of the study, and how are “incoming freshman” defined? As any student who is taking their first class at MCC, regardless of graduation date?
Someone who wanted to make the opposite point (and it would be equally statistically invalid) could do the same report on McHenry County students attending Harvard, for example. Or Private 4 year colleges in general. or U of I. pick a school, any school.
Will you please also post links to overall test scores and how they trend in each district?
38% mirrors the undocumented population of Harvard.
Where does one find the undocumented population of Harvard?
Harvard does have a large Hispanic population as previously reported on this blog.
My experience from personally and my children attending K-12 schools in IL is more time is spent on language arts (reading, spelling, vocabulary, writing, etc.) than math. Not saying that’s good or bad, it’s just the case.
I’m still looking for the name and contents of the remedial/developmental math class at MCC, and ditto now for the remedial/developmental English class at MCC.
How would a K-12 teacher in McHenry County know if a student is tracking towards a remedial Math or English class at MCC?
K-12 teachers in IL and just about all states are paid by the # of years they teach (steps) and # of college classes they pass (lanes). Not by how well their students perform or how effective they are at teaching. The teachers unions were not complaining for decades about this pay scheme. You occasionally heard complaints from hard working and well performing teachers (not unions) because their slacker or under performing counter parts received the same pay, but they would not do that publicly for fear of reprisal from the union and peers.
still looking for a valid study of McHenry County school high school graduates overall, not the small self-selecting percentage who go to the local Junior College.
also looking for the study methodology. Cal, where is the link to the original study and the methodology behind it?
thank you.
ahahahahhaha – you can find the studies pretty extensively online – it is a report out on the ACT scores basically, to assess college readiness.
Cal – why didn’t you report the scores of all the other area graduates who went to 4 year colleges? it is in the Report too, and you can see how how some of our districts score, and how they compare to all of Northern Illinois.
Also Cal….it is easy to find articles about the STATEWIDE issue with Junior College kids not being ready, and the link to No Child Left Behind.
But don’t worry, I know you have a specific agenda to put forth, so extracting 1-2 pages out of a 24 page powerpoint presentation is more your style
I see that Aileen Seedorf posted comments on the other story related to this. How sad sad sad that a D158 School Board member wouldn’t take time to know the entire study, which was published during her tenure on the school board.
I can’t find course content either. Who is required to take the classes is determined by performance on an assessment test. I couldn’t find an explanation of the expections to perform well on the test either. Though I did find that one’s ACT scores may warrant waiver of one or more of the exams.
Another contributing cause might be that four years of english, but only three years of math are required to graduate. I am curious to know how the assessment tests and remedial course content line up with the basic requirements.
Placement exams. If new students don’t meet the minimum; you must take the remedial classes.
I agree with Mark that teachers should be paid on performance and not years of tenure. Some teachers have 20 years tenure but it was one year experience 20 times. No better than a rookie teacher but receive top dollar
The way K-12 teachers and principals are evaluated in IL is changing as a result of a new law in 2010 and another in 2011.
On January 15, 2010, the “Performance Evaluation Reform Act” (PERA) was signed by Quinn. It’s Senate Bill 315 (SB 315), Public Act 96-0861 (PA 96-0861).
That bill specifically states, according to the Illinois Association of School Boards (IASB), “effective teachers and school leaders are a critical factor contributing to student achievement” and that “many existing district performance evaluation systems fail to adequately distinguish between effective and ineffective teachers and principals.”
PERA was largely reactionary to improve Illinois’ application to the US Department of Education in an attempt to win federal stimulus funds in the form of an American Reinvestment & Recovery Act (ARRA) initiative called “Race to the Top” (RTTP).
States desiring to receive RTTP funding applied to the US Department of Education. Forty-one states applied in Round 1, and Thirty-six states applied in Round 2. Cumulatively, including Rounds 1 & 2, twelve states each received $75 Million – $700 Million, for a total of $3.925 Billion.
Round One winners were announced March 29, 2010. Round Two winners were announced August 24, 2010. Although a finalist in both rounds, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) was not one of the twelve state boards of education which received funding.
Next up was the Education Reform bill which Quinn signed June 13, 2011. This is Senate Bill 7 (SB7), Public Act 97-0008 (PA 97-008). SB7 builds on PERA and addresses tenure, Reduction In Force (RIF), teacher ratings, and other items.
http://www.isbe.net/PEAC/default.htm
http://www.iasb.com/govrel/sb7analysis.pdf