You can forget about any humility you might have expected after the Virginia education media falsely claimed for months that 70+ Virginia schools would fall into the bottom two summative categories of the new accountability systems (Off Track, needs intensive support) when it was in fact in the 30s. The Washington Post has a 1,600-word article this week, which devotes a large amount of column space to implying a government conspiracies.

The Post spends the majority of its other columns implying, in an astonishing way, that the fact the new system will bring greater transparency to Virginia’s education inequality is a bad thing. This transparency is not a flaw, but a feature. We’ll stop discussing educational inequality in private and start doing it publicly with the new transparent system. This will allow us to better allocate resources to schools who need help.

Washington Post sees government conspiracy in press mistake

The Virginia education press reported a fabricated 70% metric. This was first estimated at a meeting of the Virginia Board of Education in August.

Anna Bryson, of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, was the one who made it widely known. Seven weeks after the Virginia Department of Education received the last of the information, it provided a FAQ that showed 37% of Virginia’s schools to be in the bottom 2 tiers.

The Post article published this week (six months after the FAQ) does not mention the clear disclaimer on the August slide regarding the partially modeled information, or Coons’ warning at the same August VBOE. The Post implies that the subsequent 37% to 35 % adjustment made after the FAQ was a major statistical realignment.

The slide for August is shown below (note the large warning).

The Post also mentions that the July VBOE projection projected that 60% schools would be in two of the lowest tiers. What did the Post not mention? The projection was made based on the 2022-23 academic year, using “partially modelled data,” but it was also discussed in the July meeting that the numbers would be expected to drop significantly for the 2023-24 academic year as the learning loss due to COVID closures has dissipated.

The Post also fails to mention that Superintendent Coons stated at the VBOE’s work session last week that “partially modeled” data for the 2023-24 year was used because the data collection was ongoing until September 30th. This is the same as it always is with Virginia accreditation data and accountability data.

The Post does not give any space in its columns to the many supporters of the new system, and only gives a brief quote from the VDOE. The lobbyists don’t seem to know that the July and August data were partial. These lobbyist critics, however, may be misinformed if they haven’t read Bacon’s Rebellion. Instead, they rely on the Post or the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Washington Post Finds Negatives In Exposing Virginia’s Educational Inequality

The Post takes a conspiratorial approach to the fact the new system shows huge demographic differences in Virginia school’s performance. Virginia has vast differences in the demographics of its students, and many schools are segregated based on demographics. What is the Post’s counterfactual? Not to discuss it? To use Mitt Romney 2012’s suggestion, are these discussions only for “quiet rooms”?

Here are some of the educational inequalities that resulted from the previous “quiet room” system, which was a combined system of accreditation and accountability.

The NAEP results for the 4th grade reading section in 2022 showed:

• The performance of African American students in Virginia was significantly lower than that of African American Students in Mississippi.
• Virginia’s economically-disadvantaged students did significantly worse than Mississippi’s economically-disadvantaged students.
• From 1998 to 2022
  • The large gaps between Virginia’s African American and White students did little to change.
  • The large gaps between Hispanic students and White students in Virginia did not change significantly.
  • The gap between Virginia’s African American and White students has widened.

According to the results of 2022 NAEP math 4th grade section, between 2000 and 2022:

• The gap between Virginia’s African American students and white students has widened.
• The gap between Hispanics and White students in Virginia has widened.
• The gap between Virginia’s economically challenged students and those who are not has grown even wider.

According to The Education Trust civil rights group, accountability systems were designed to identify “which schools and district are struggling to meet the needs of students and have student groups disparities and — most important — use this information in order to target additional resources to address these needs.” Civil rights groups had repeatedly criticized the old system for its opaqueness.

Teachers are insulted by the claims of those who oppose accountability, that the hardworking teachers at these struggling schools would leave them at a moment’s notice. Teachers in these schools are aware of the struggles of their students and choose to work there to make a bigger impact.

Andy Rotherham, a Democratic VBOE Member and national accountability expert (whom both Governors Mark Warner & Glenn Youngkin nominated) stated this at the VBOE Work Session held last week:

“We keep going around and round on this.” With all due respect, I understand why [Northern Virginia School] divisions would want to delay. Rotherham stated that if I were in one of these divisions I would also want to delay. “Because disaggregated responsibility [by race or socioeconomic status]” Some of the stories that we have been telling reveal some uncomfortable truths.

A Statistical Analysis of the New System by Chollet is a Wake-Up Call for Virginia

The Post attempted to do a limited statistical analysis in order to demonstrate this correlation. Eileen Chollet is a parent at Fairfax County Public Schools and a citizen journalist. She did a much more in-depth statistical analysis on X, aka Twitter, several weeks ago. This was likely the source of the Post’s idea.

Chollet’s statistical analyses of such a thread X has some interesting highlights: