Parent Pages
Sibling Pages
Child Pages
The Spring, 2000 SOL data showed up on the State Education Dept web site on October 11, 2000. With the full dataset we can compare Richmond with other jurisdictions.
Here are the high school results (Note: EOC = End of Course):
Finally, here is a look at the Richmond high schools score changes from 98 to 00. The gold square is the statewide average; the red diamond is the Richmond average; we have identified Marshall (green diamond) and TJ because they are nearby and Open, Community, and Governor's because of their relatively better performance.
Looks like something good is going on in the English department at John Marshall.
In sum, we see that Dr. Williams' optimism is not grounded in reality. Of course, if your job depended on improving these awful scores, you also would find reason for optimism. In contrast, if you are a taxpayer you probably should be wondering why we spend so much money for schools that do so badly.
In general, we can say that the Richmond scores are far behind the statewide average, and increasing (where they are increasing) more slowly than the statewide average. Dr. Williams' spin about his "optimism" cannot change that. Indeed, as long as this synthetic "optimism" is the official line, it will indicate that the school system remains in denial.
The first step to improvement is to assess the problem. Richmond continues to deny that it has a problem. As a result, the Richmond schools continue to squander our tax money on a system that fails, and will continue to fail, to educate Richmond's children.
Back to the Top
Back to the Testing Page
Back to the Issues Page
Last updated 02/24/02
Please send questions or comments to John
Butcher