When I used to work at a charter school, the founder used to say he didn’t want to “beat the odds”, he wanted to “change the odds.” In Los Angeles Unified, the odds for success in science are low. Only 54% of district students (Charter and District) are proficient in 8th science according to the CST.
When you compare low income to high income students, the gap is stark. 68% of high income students are proficient in science, while only 50% of low income students show proficiency. Seeing this data, it made me wonder: Which schools are changing the odds?
I am only looking at LAUSD district schools with extremely high socioeconomically disadvantaged populations (80% or higher). Why? I wanted to look at schools that have minimal resources beyond the things the state gives them. Charters tend to have high levels of donations and grants, while schools with more wealthy students have the ability to run fundraisers that provide extra money for the school. These schools are merely odds beaters, not odds changers. To change the odds, you have to do better with the same.
So, without further ado, the best schools for science for low income students:
And the worst schools:
A couple of interesting bits. Walnut Park B and Walnut Park A are mirror images, yet live on the same campus. One has 65% proficiency, while the other has 29%.
Another interesting comparison is Irving and Luther Burbank, which are only a few miles apart. Irving is a wall-to-wall magnet with engineering as a focus. Yet, their scores for low income students (and across the school) are very poor compared to Luther Burbank, which remains a neighborhood school (and yes…i am biased, deal with it.).
Is there a pattern in the location of the schools? A map might help….
Red schools are the lowest performers and green schools are the highest performers. As in other areas, South Los Angeles struggles to provide sufficient education for their students.
But there is another trend: There is a succeeding school in all of the areas of Los Angeles – South LA has Orchard, the valley has Olive Vista and Central LA has Bancroft Middle. it is possible to be an odds changer anywhere in Los Angeles.