Tag Archives: K-8 schools

Minneapolis Public Schools: Surrounded by K-8 Charter Options

Uncategorized, , , ,

January 6, 2020

If the Minneapolis Public Schools succeeds in turning the district into K-5 and 6-8 schools only, as its current Comprehensive District Design proposal strongly suggests, it will become surrounded by a sea of K-8 options within and just outside its boundaries.

Of the one hundred sixty-four charter schools currently in operation in Minnesota, half are at least K-6 schools. Most are exclusively K-8. Many more are K-12, and of course this has something to do with the need and desire to retain students for as long as possible, for funding and programmatic reasons.

In Minneapolis alone, there are thirteen K-8 charter schools. Many attract non-white populations, despite the claim that students of color either do not do well in K-8s or that families of color are not seeking them. (Watch the Minneapolis school board’s December 12, 2019 Committee of the Whole meeting for a discussion of this.)

If higher standardized test scores are the measure of equity and success–which I would dispute wholeheartedly–then parents from all walks of life appear to be disregarding this when choosing K-8s. In a list of area K-8 schools provided below, I include test score and demographic data that illustrates this very point.

Most K-8s in and around Minneapolis in fact have MCA test score results that are lower than or equal to MPS sites with similar student demographics.

Of all the charter schools in Minneapolis, Yinghua Academy in Northeast has the highest percentage of students with grade-level (or above) math and reading MCA scores. This is not hard to imagine because test scores most closely match students’ socioeconomic status (or, as MPS administrator Eric Moore said recently, “test scores follow students”), and just ten percent of Yinghua Academy students live in poverty.

But scores notched at Yinghua are still lower than those at the district’s Lake Harriet School in southwest Minneapolis, which is a K-8 dual campus site where only 7 percent of students qualify for free and reduced lunch.

It is very difficult to compare these schools to one another, simply on paper. And, of course, MCA test scores do a terrible job of telling the far more complex story of any school. But it does beg the question of what criteria families are using to select schools for their kids.

Does MPS have this information?

If parents, and especially parents from marginalized communities, are not choosing K-8s because they can promise higher standardized test scores, why are they choosing them? What about this model is attracting thousands of kids who, perhaps, would otherwise be attending a Minneapolis public school?

The answer may lie in the fact that public education has become a choice-based marketplace, dominated by increasingly segregated, privately managed but publicly funded schools that are as subject to fraud and failure as any traditional public school.

And what will happen if MPS further reduces or altogether eliminates its K-8 sites, under the clearly mistaken assumption that K-5s and stand-alone middle schools are either better for students or more appealing to families?

K-8 and K-6 Charter Schools in Minneapolis (including demographic and test score data obtained from the Minnesota Department of Education)

Best Academy in north Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 756
  • 98.1% Black or African-American; 88% Free and Reduced Lunch (FRL)
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 25.4%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 32.1%
  • Authorizer: Audubon Center of the North Woods (*authorizers receive thousands per year, per charter school, in taxpayer dollars to oversee school quality)

Bdote Learning Center in south Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 101
  • 81.2% American Indian or Alaska Native; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 2%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 0%
  • Bdote offers context for its lower scores here, through an language immersion lens
  • Authorizer: Innovative Quality Schools

Brightwater Elementary, north Minneapolis. Pre K-6. Preschool is private (tuition-based), K-6 is a charter school.

  • Student enrollment: 160
  • Nearly evenly split between White and Black or African-American students, with smaller percentages of other groups; 53% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 20.7%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 35.4%
  • Authorizer: Audubon Center of the North Woods

Cedar Riverside Community School, south Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 140
  • 92.9% Black or African-American; 7.1% Hispanic or Latino; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 20.8%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 33.3%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities

Friendship Academy of the Arts, south Minneapolis. “Due to family and community demand, FAA has expanded to  a K-8 school.”

  • Student enrollment: 168
  • 98.2% Black or African-American; 73% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 51.7%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 52.8%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities

Hennepin Schools, south Minneapolis. K-8, dual campus.

  • Student enrollment: 268
  • 94.8% Black or African-American; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 44.7%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 40.5%
  • Based on the sample schedule listed online, students are in school from 8:30-4:35 with one 15 minute recess
  • Authorizer: Friends of Education

KIPP North Star, north Minneapolis. K-8. KIPP has a “strategic plan to grow to four schools by 2024.”

  • Student enrollment: 203
  • 97% Black or African-American; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 19%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 26.4%
  • Authorizer: Volunteers of America

Mastery School, north Minneapolis. K-6.

  • Student enrollment: 230
  • 94.3% Black or African-American; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 23.2%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 31.2%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities

New City School, northeast Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 306
  • 56.9% White, 22.9% Black or African-American; 32% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 49.5%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 63.5%
  • Authorizer: Novation Education Opportunities

Northeast College Prep, northeast Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 319
  • 68% Black or African-American, 16% White; 90% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 41.8%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 39.7%
  • Authorizer: Student Achievement Minnesota LLC

Skyline Math and Science Academy, south Minneapolis. K-6.

  • This is school has yet to open.
  • Authorizer: Minnesota Guild of Public Charter Schools

Sojourner Truth Academy, north Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 389
  • 74.6% Black or African-American; 18.5% Hispanic or Latino; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 13.7%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 13.3%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities

Southside Family Charter School, south Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 116
  • 39.7% White; 21.6% Two or More Races; 47% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 47.3%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 60.8%
  • Authorizer: Volunteers of America

Spero Academy, northeast Minneapolis. K-6.

  • Student enrollment: 127
  • 55.9% White, 15.7% Black or African-American; 40% FRL
  • Almost 100 percent of students qualify for special education services
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 34.3%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 35.7%
  • Authorizer: University of St. Thomas

Stonebridge World School, south Minneapolis. K-6.

  • Student enrollment: 287
  • 64.8% Black or African-American; 22% Hispanic or Latino; 84% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 16.4%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 25.3%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities

Twin Cities International Schools, north Minneapolis. K-8.

  • Student enrollment: 1,021
  • 99.9% Black or African-American; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 41%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 43.3%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities

Universal Academy, south Minneapolis. Pre K-8

  • Student enrollment: 403
  • 97.3 Black or African-American; 86% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 24.4%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 30.5%
  • Authorizer: Novation Education Opportunities

Yinghua Academy, northeast Minneapolis. K-8 Dual Immersion (Mandarin).

  • Student enrollment: 822
  • 53% White; 30.9% Asian; 10% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 84.5%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 74.2%
  • Authorizer: Friends of Education

And here is a quick look at a few of the non- K-5s near Minneapolis:

Loveworks Academy for Visual and Performing Arts, Golden Valley. K-8. *frequent recipient of philanthropic funds despite notably low results

  • Student enrollment: 159
  • 94.3% Black or African-American; 95% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 6.7%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 15.4%
  • Authorizer: Pillsbury United Communities.

Nasha Shkola, Brooklyn Park. K-8. Focused on the “unique needs” of Slavic and Russian immigrant students, as well as those interested in learning Russian.

  • Student enrollment: 99
  • 94.9% White; 70% FRL
  • Percent of students with math MCA scores: 65.6%
  • Percent of students with reading MCA scores: 47.5%
  • Authorizer: Innovative Quality Schools

Noble Academy, Brooklyn Park. Pre K-12. A growing charter school that recently expanded to include grades 9-12, with a special focus on Hmong language and culture.

  • Student enrollment: 1, 029
  • 86.9% Asian, 11.3% Black or African-American; 52% FRL
  • Percent of students with grade-level math MCA scores: 59.8%
  • Percent of students with grade-level reading MCA scores: 49.1%
  • Authorizer: Audubon Center of the North Woods

In January, MPS will begin holding information sessions regarding its Comprehensive District Design, with a final proposal expected in March. Thus far, the only versions of this redesign shown to the public have included nothing but separate K-5 and 6-8 schools. 

We must ask why this is, when the evidence clearly shows that all types of families are actively choosing the K-8 model. This points to another problem with the proposed redesign: the lack of ground-level staff and community input.

Minneapolis Public Schools Plan Does Not Include K-8 Schools

Uncategorized, , , , , ,

December 8, 2019

In 2017, New York University professor Elise Cappella made this point, in reference to a study she had just helped conduct regarding middle schools and their impact on students:

“Research broadly supports the idea that K-8 is a better choice, overall,” Cappella said in an interview with Joshua A. Kirsch.

You would never know that by looking at the latest iteration of the Minneapolis Public Schools Comprehensive District Design plan.

On December 8, the district released its latest teaser, offering a look at the direction it is headed while claiming no ownership over the ideas. “It’s just a study,” district representatives keep insisting, regarding the information it has been releasing lately–all while simultaneously outlining a rapid timeline for a final school board vote.

  • Public engagement regarding the district’s various design studies and models will take place in January and February, 2020
  • The school board will be asked to vote on a final Comprehensive Design plan on March 10, 2020
  • The December 8 document is called “Phase 2 Boundary Study Presentation,” to be shared with the school board during its December 12 Committee of the Whole meeting. (There will be no public input at this meeting; those wishing to speak up will need to do so at the December 10 school board meeting.)

The presentation is framed as simply a “what-if” scenario, designed to see the “impact on integration and transportation if all K-8 students attended their community schools.”

And those community schools are only either K-5s or middle schools serving 6-8 grade students. All existing K-8 schools, including Marcy Open, Seward Montessori and Barton Open, are reconfigured in this PowerPoint as K-5 sites, although Seward retains its Montessori programming.

All three schools currently serve 700 or more students from diverse racial and economic backgrounds. Under this MPS plan, or study, those schools would shrink in size and arguably become more segregated.

While the December 8 document is being pitched as just a study–as in, nothing to see here, folks–it fits into an ongoing pattern. Over the past 18 months, MPS administrators (mostly Eric Moore, Chief of Accountability, Research, and Equity) have created and shared PowerPoint presentations that offer a skewed perspective on district data, with information either missing or inaccurately presented.

For an example of this, review either the documents or video from the school board’s November 23 half-day retreat. There, Moore offered a lengthy look at how the district is configured, from a school boundary perspective. (One data point that was missing: the highest concentration of enrollment losses at MPS occurs from 5th-6th grade–but not at K-8 schools.)

Many of the PowerPoint slides he shared, however, were less than fulsome. Slide number 17, for example, bears the label, “Lack of Effectiveness of Magnet Schools, and then notes that “1/3 of MPS magnets lost students of color from 2013-2017.”

But 2/3 of magnets gained students of color–even if these gains were “inconsistent or minimal,” as the PowerPoint slide claims. The gains must mean something–but what? There was no analysis of that, only the perception that magnets–which MPS has routinely claimed–are not working, either for integration or improved student outcome purposes.

Another example comes from the zig-zagged transportation routes shared at the November 23 retreat.

Only magnet school routes were included, making it look as though magnets are an outsized burden on the district, while open enrollment routes (where kids are bused to community schools outside of their own neighborhoods) were absent–even though we know that, particularly in north and northeast Minneapolis, students are bused all over the place as a retention and enrollment strategy.

The key thing here is, as a friend advised me, to think about what story the district is trying to tell, and what conclusions they are working towards. Going back just until the summer of 2018, when the district’s initial comprehensive redesign plans were publicly presented, there is a consistent through-line:

  • Magnets are not working
  • K-8s are not a worthwhile investment
  • The district is easier to map out and, perhaps, manage, using a K-5, 6-8 only plan
  • Shrinking the number of magnets and moving them will save MPS money and naturally promote integration (assuming all kids currently in the system stay in MPS, no matter which school they are assigned to)

It is impossible to say what the purpose of all this is. MPS appears poised to claim that eliminating K-8 schools, greatly reducing magnets (and replacing them with nebulous “specialty schools,” in a nod to the “coordinated uniqueness” pitch that once accompanied these plans), and concentrating greater numbers of students in large middle schools will save money and improve transportation, if not student, outcomes.

But, as far as I know, there has been little if any input here from front line staff, including teachers, support staff, and site-based administrators.

This is a problem.

Without ground-level guidance, this runs the risk of being little more than another top-down, hit and run way to hobble already-strong (or newly emerging) programs rather than learn from them.

Many MPS veterans, including students, parents, teachers, and administrators, have battle scars already, thanks to previous plans that promised big things while failing to adequately consider the insights of those who will be held accountable when things veer off course.

Knowing that middle schoolers, even eighth graders, are still the children who played tag at recess a mere three or four years before, is not infantilizing, but humanizing to the young adolescent.

—Claire Needel Hollander, New York City public school teacher