Rankings and Scores Compared to 24 other High Schools and 29 other K-8’s
The dashboard that we have been using includes six other schools we felt were comparable to Berkeley Heights. Families can know that the picture is perhaps even more concerning than what our dashboard depicts.
When we broaden the sample to 25 schools we find that Governor Livingston is tied for third in having the largest decline of all high schools in the rankings which, as we’ve discussed, is driven in large part by student proficiencies in Match, Science and English.
Berkeley Heights K-8 placed 22 out of 30 Schools when looking at ratings and scores (this was a bit of a rough one to figure out given the different configurations).
During the last Board of Education Meeting, Ms. Khanna and Dr. Forreger asked that the BOE direct the Superintendent to explain the declines. Ms. Penna and Ms. Stanley voted “No”, Ms. Young, Mr. Cianculli, Ms. Bradford Abstained. The result of the “No” Votes and Abstentions blocked the measure and Ms. Penna threw the issue into a committee the public does not have access to.
However, based on Dr. Varley’s statements, she believes the declines are due to COVID and AP students not taking the test seriously.
Surprisingly, all the high schools on this list also went through COVID. Even more incredible is that they also have AP Students. Elementary schools on this list experienced COVID as well and, like Berkeley Heights, do not have AP students – so it is clear that further evaluation is needed.
Perhaps the Superintendent could compare our performance to Districts whose students were not impacted by COVID and High Schools that did not have AP Students or whose AP students (unlike Berkeley Heights AP Students according to the Superintendent) cared about their performance on the tests.
BHCW has taken on the role of providing information and possible explanations on this issue to the community- and will continue to do so in the weeks and years ahead until the community has a reasonable basis for confidence that the Superintendent and BOE Majority take the issue of proficiency seriously.
Reassignments, Resignations and the Berkeley Heights Public School District’s Decline
Putting It All Together – Rankings, Ratings, Proficiency and Budget
Five More Snapshots of the BHPSNJ Decline
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