At-Large Elections

I'm sure you've all heard the talk of moving towards at-large elections. I support this move for two main reasons, accountability and equity. Currently our BOE members are only accountable to their own constituents for their decisions, even though their decisions impact all residents in the county. Further complicating matters is that while somebody may live in one district, their children may attend school in another district (sometimes even more than one other district) due to either base assignment or magnet attendance. Who truly represents the interests of those families?

While accountability is an issue in this matter, equity is by far the most important one. Because the district boundaries are drawn only every ten years with the census, Wake County's tremendous growth causes those districts to become extremely unbalanced before the next redistricting. According to information I found on the WCPSS website, "To comply with one-person, one-vote, no district should be more than five percent above or below the population of the ideal-size district." At that time, it was reported in the June 1, 2001 edition of 'School Connections' that "The board used data from the 2000 Census and advice from its legal staff to draw districts equal in population. The nine districts had to include between 66,723 and 73,249 voters to meet legal requirements."

I do not have access to population figures for each of our BOE districts, but we all have access to the voter registration figures for each district as well as the school and student numbers for each district. While it is not the same as having population numbers, we can still look at those figures to get an idea of how unbalanced the districts are.

First, the voter registration numbers:

If we use the same criteria that WCPSS used in 2001, the ideal district would have about 58,493 voters in it. Adding the 5% variance above or below that ideal number, then each district should have between 55,568 and 61,418 voters. We currently only have 1 district that falls within those criteria.

Now for a repeat of the student population numbers by district:

You can see that we have very unbalanced districts and I think its safe to say that this is due to the tremendous growth in the 'suburban' areas of the county. Even after the district boundaries are redrawn with the next census(2010-11), this same imbalance will occur by the time we redraw the boundaries again in 2020-11. The growth may occur in different areas of the county, but the imbalance will be there and citizens will not be properly represented. We can avoid this heavy imbalance by moving towards district seats that are voted on by all citizens. This will ensure that no areas of the county carry more pull than they should and more importantly, that some areas of the county are not underrepresented.

This is a bi-partisan issue that will ensure fairness for ALL citizens, whether they be Republican or Democrat, urban or rural, or live in 'old' Raleigh, North Raleigh, Apex, Zebulon, or Cary. Please write your NC Senate and House Reps, your mayor, city council members, and BOE rep in support of at-large elections.

Equal Representation Revisted

A while back I posted the numbers of students in each BOE district. The imbalance was startling. I ran the numbers for 2007-08 and not much has changed. 'County' districts are underrepresented while Cary and Raleigh 'city' districts are overrepresented again.

What Did MYR Conversions Do To Your Chances?

I was struck by a few of the converted schools that were so underenrolled that they didn't qualify for any of the rounds in the magnet lottery. Since they had F&R low enough to qualify, I wondered how the conversions affected their chances.

This year's criteria were very similar to last year's. The only differences were Round One going to the 4 demagnetized schools and the capacity figure of 85% used in later rounds. Last year's capacity figure was 90% for the later rounds. Following is a table that shows the earliest round that each converted elementary was eligible for last year as well as this year. I adjusted this year's rounds by removing the special consideration for the demagnetized schools. So Rounds 2-5 became Rounds 1-4 this year to make the comparison more in line. As you will see, not all of the schools were affected but Baucom, Green Hope, Middle Creek and Wakefield were the most negatively affected by the conversions.

45 out of 96?!?

Students from 45 out of the 96 elementary schools get to compete for the last 10% of magnet seats. Interesting and frankly, a bit shocking and sad.

Only 25 base school applicants have to compete for the first FOUR rounds of magnet selection. Even sadder.

So What Are Your Chances?

I posted the criteria for getting selected for a magnet program in the last post. But what does that mean for you?

Even without knowing the F&R% of your particular node, we can still see which base schools give you the best chance of being accepted to a magnet. According to WCPSS, 31.6% of all elementary students participate in the Free & Reduced Lunch Program. I rounded that up to 32% then considered 27% to be 5% points below the average. After siblings are placed, the earliest you can be accepted into an elementary magnet based on your current base school is:

Round One--4 Schools
Base or Magnet students at Root, Olds, Forestville,and Lincoln Heights.

Rounds Two and Three--15 Schools
**Must live in a node 27% or less F&R, base school must be 27% or less F&R, and crowding factor must be greater than 100%
Baileywick
Brassfield
Cedar Fork
Davis Drive
Forest Pines
Hunter (magnet, not sure they have any base nodes under 27% F&R)
Lacy
Oak Grove
Partnership (magnet, not sure they have any base nodes under 27% F&R)
Pleasant Union
Turner Creek
Wake Forest
Weatherstone
West Lake
Wiley (magnet at 27.7%--not sure how WCPSS would treat this)

Round Four--6 Schools
**Must live in a node with 27% or less F&R, base school must be 27% or less F&R, and crowding factor must be greater than 85%
Ballentine
Brier Creek
Highcroft
Jones Dairy
Morrisville
Salem

Round Five--26 Schools
**No requirement for F&R of your node, base school crowding factor must be at least 85%, and no more than 40% F&R
Adams
Apex
Brooks (magnet)
Combs (magnet)
Dillard Drive
Douglas (magnet)
Durant Road
Farmington Woods
Fuller (magnet)
Fuquay-Varina
Green
Harris Creek
Hilburn Drive
Holly Ridge
Jeffrey's Grove
Joyner (magnet)
North Ridge
Northwoods
Penny Road
Rolesville
Swift Creek
Timber Drive
Underwood (magnet)
Washington (magnet)
Wildwood Forest
Yates Mill

Lottery for the Remaining 10% of Seats--45 Schools
**Comments after each school indicate why it wasn't considered in the first 5 rounds.
Aversboro (53.3% F&R)
Baucom (82.3% crowding, but only 12.1% F&R)
Barwell Road (57.9% F&R)
Brentwood (65.8% F&R, 24.3% Level 1 or 2)
Briarcliff (40.9% F&R, but 112.5% crowding)
Bugg (magnet, 44.4% F&R, but 129.4% crowding)
Carpenter (73.2% crowding, but only 14.7% F&R)
Carver (61.8% F&R, 71.6% crowding)
Cary (40.9% F&R, but 120.6% crowding)
Conn (magnet, 44.8% F&R, but 117.4% crowding)
Creech Road (62.4% F&R, but 109.8 crowding)
East Garner (59% F&R, 52.4% crowding)
Fox Road (52.9% F&R)
Green Hope (82.9% crowding, but only 5.9% F&R)
Hodge Road (58.6% F&R)
Holly Springs (78.7% crowding, but only 17.3% F&R)
Heritage (79.1% crowding, but only 24.4% F&R)
Holly Grove (82.3% crowding, but only 16.9% F&R)
Kingswood (41.4% F&R, but 120.8 crowding)
Knightdale (62% F&R, 83% crowding)
Leesville Road (76.7% crowding, but only 12% F&R)
Leadmine (41.7% F&R, but 101.1% crowding)
Lockhart (45.8% F&R, 75.7% crowding)
Lynn Road (41.7 % F&R, 74.3% crowding)
Middle Creek (77.4% crowding, but only 20.5% F&R)
Millbrook (magnet, 55.5% F&R, but 107.6% crowding)
North Forest Pines (66% crowding, but only 21.6% F&R)
Olive Chapel (81.7% crowding, but only 4.9% F&R)
Poe (47.2% F&R, but 111.7% crowding)
Powell (57.7% F&R, but 115.1% crowding)
Rand Road (82.7% crowding, but only 25.6% F&R)
Reedy Creek (83.6% crowding)
River Bend (57.5% F&R)
Sanford Creek (64.9% crowding)
Smith (70.8% F&R, but 106.8% crowding)
Stough (46.4% F&R)
Vance (75.5% crowding, but only 20.4% F&R)
Vandora Springs (52.2% F&R)
Wakefield (82.4% crowding, but only 25.6% F&R)
Wakelon (78.9% crowding, 63.5% F&R)
Wendell (46.8% F&R, but 105.6 crowding)
Wilburn (79.4% crowding, 53.5% F&R)
Willow Springs (82.8% crowding)
York (49.2% F&R, but 103.7% crowding)
Zebulon (equity magnet, 75.2% crowding, 56.6% F&R)

Magnet Selection Criteria

I've mentioned here before that the magnet 'lottery' isn't a true lottery. It's weighted--certain nodes of students have a better chance of getting into a magnet than others do. WCPSS has released the selection criteria for this year.

SELECTION CRITERIA – ELEMENTARY MAGNET
Siblings of present magnet students identified on the intent form

After assigning the students who meet the criteria above, the school will determine the number of vacancies available.

90% of these vacancies will be filled from valid applications in the following order:

ROUND ONE (For 2008-09 only)
· M or B from 413, 476, 524, or 548 This translates to magnet or base from Forestville, Root, Olds and Lincoln Heights. Those are 4 of the schools that were demagnetized this year. In the case of Forestville, it was supposed to get a magnet program but then the board decided against it AFTER families had applied for the program. Note that Wake Forest Elementary isn't included on this list because it was an equity magnet, meaning that it was entirely base, no applications. I don't have a problem with them not getting priority for magnet programs, but why do the base populations at the other 4 schools get priority?

ROUND TWO
· Live in a node where the SES percentage for elementary aged children is at least 5% below the county average AND
· Assigned to a base school where the SES for elementary aged children is at least 5% below the county average AND
· Assigned to a base school where the 2-year average of level 1 and 2 percentage students tested is 20% or less AND
· Assigned to a base school that has a current crowding factor above 100% of the adjusted building capacity AND
· Submitted a valid application for the same program the previous year

ROUND THREE
· Same as Round Two with deletion of previous year’s application

ROUND FOUR
· Same as Round Three with the revision of the crowding factor to be above 85% of the adjusted building capacity.

ROUND FIVE
· Assigned to a base school that has a crowding factor above 85% of the adjusted building capacity AND
· Assigned to a base school where the SES for elementary aged children is less than 40% AND
· Assigned to a base school where the 2-year average of level 1 and 2 percentage students tested is 20% or less.

Ten percent (10%) of vacancies identified above will be filled randomly from all remaining valid applications.

SELECTION CRITERIA – SECONDARY MAGNET
The selection process for secondary schools is the same as elementary with the addition of the second priority which states that students currently attending a magnet school and have magnet status have a priority to attend a magnet school in the next grade configuration: middle school or high school.

How Does F&R % Affect EOG Passing Rates? Updated

As I was updating my spreadsheets with EOG passing rates from the 2006-07 NC Report Cards, I noticed that I made a mistake the first time I posted these figures. I used the F&R percentages from 2006-07 but the EOG passing rates from 2005-06. So I redid the tables with the F&R and EOG rates from the same years. Not much changed--the results still show that the Non-Economically Disadvantaged (NED) children's EOG scores went down as F&R went up while the Economically Disadvantaged (ED) children's scores didn't seem to follow any pattern.