Island teachers are once again voicing their displeasure at the ranking of elementary schools.
And this year they happen to have the backing of the Island MLA who also happens to be B.C.’s education minister
The Fraser Institute, a right-wing think tank, released its annual Report Card on British Columbia’s Elementary Schools Saturday, April 21.
Denise Wood, Nanaimo District Teachers’ Association president, questions how advantageous the results are.
“I think the Fraser Institute isn’t really using any information that is useful to anyone else,” said Wood. “The [Foundation Skills Assessment tests] are what they have and those were not designed to allow schools to compete against each other or allow other organizations to rank schools. I think it’s totally inappropriate for anyone to be paying any attention to Fraser Institute rankings.”
Wood is against ranking of schools altogether and said there are a lot of factors to consider if parents are trying to determine if their child should go to a certain school and the institute’s rankings shouldn’t be a factor at all.
RELATED: 16 of 20 fastest-improving B.C. schools are public, says Fraser Institute
B.C. Education Minister Rob Fleming expressed similar concerns. In an e-mailed statement, Fleming said he was disappointed that elementary schools had once again been ranked by the institute. Grading schools using a “narrow set of indicators” doesn’t give an accurate portrayal of the province’s classrooms, but rather gives a simple snapshot that ignores a number of factors, he said.
Fleming also said he wasn’t against having discussion about the performance of schools, however, the efforts to improve must be based on “real and meaningful information from a broad range of sources.”
There has been suggestion that rankings pit private schools against public schools, but the Fraser Institute defended its methodology, stating that 16 of the 20 fastest improving schools in this year’s report were public schools.
“All too often we hear excuses that public schools can’t improve student performance because of the communities and the students they serve, but the evidence suggests otherwise,” said Peter Cowley, institute director of school performance studies, in a press release.
reporter@nanaimobulletin.com
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