Lies about Wisconsin ACT / SAT rank vs. No Collective Bargaining States

Ax D WhiteMan Show ^ | 9/20/2011 | Ax D WhiteMan

[crescen7]

Since Saturday February 19th, I believe we've heard the following statement repeated endlessly on twitter, blog posts, and even a news report.

ACT/SAT rank = Wisc #2 ... no collective bargaining states: Virginia 44, Texas 47, Georgia 48, N.Carolina 49, S.Carolina 50

This "fact" was even mentioned in an hourly news update. The problem with this statement, like so many other politically motivated statements, is that it appears to be completely false.

[crescen7]

Not really a surprise that libs lie about such things, but interesting to trace back the source of the lies and compare them with some verifiable fact.

[NoLibZone]

Almost 1 in 3 Wisconsin Teachers students attend private schools.

[NoLibZone]

Almost 1 in 3 Wisconsin Teachers’ CHILDREN attend private schools.

[NoLibZone]

What percentage of students in Virginia , Texas , Georgia , N.Carolina , S.Carolina attend private vs public schools?

[Hojczyk]

Schools are bad all over the country...my wife taught at Air Academy school district in Colorado Springs..a good school district...I in the teachers are not very good..and you cannot get rid of them..

[Hojczyk]

one in three teachers

[goodnesswins]

and here’s why....

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2676904/posts

[marstegreg]

Almost 1 in 3 Wisconsin Teachers’ CHILDREN attend private schools.

That is true. Our children attend Catholic school here in Ohio. It took me a few years to get to know people but when I did, I was shocked to find out how many of the parents were public school teachers.

[truthguy]

Almost 1 in 3 Wisconsin Teachers’ CHILDREN attend private schools.

I'm sure that's true and it isn't just Wisconsin. I personally know 2 public teachers who send their children to private schools. And both say that they would send their kids to public schools IF they could find a safe public school where their kids could get a good education. Both of these women work and their husbands work. They both have made huge sacrifices in their standard of living so that they could give their kids a better education.

And incidentally, for at least one of these woman, their private school spends considerably less per pupil per year than the public school that their daughter could attend if she wished.

[EQAndyBuzz]

Texas = Homeschooling. Put those kids back into the equation and Texas shoots up the list.

As an FYI, Wisconsin is #44 out of 57 states.

[scooby321]

I am not a racist but Wisconsin has 91% white. 6.48 Black I bet those other states don’t have that ratio.

[The Antiyuppie]

“I am not a racist but Wisconsin has 91% white. 6.48 Black I bet those other states don’t have that ratio.”

Unfortunately, this is an inescapable truth. also, take a look also at Iowa in educational rankings.

A trick that had been used in the past that made southern schools look much worse than northern schools was that poor students were discouraged from taking SAT/ACT tests in the north. In some southern states, all students were encouraged to take them.

[scooby321]

Milwaukee has 43% white 39% black. 1 in 3 send their kids to private schools. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9x2N4bDmzdc&feature=player_embedded#at=13 see how much teachers get paid how many are failing.

[buwaya]

Use NAEP scores disaggregated by race - because a lot of the lower-scoring states have a higher proportion of black and hispanic students.

Since most scores better follow race than any other factor, its best to compare white vs white, black vs black, etc. by state. Most discrepancies in educational performance between states are best explained by the population mix.

Here is one place to get them -

http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pubs/stt2009/20104548.asp

The results of a disaggregated analysis are very interesting.

Texas, for instance, far outperforms Wisconsin for white, black and hispanic 8th grade students

8th Grade Mathematics 2009 Avg Score
Texas Wisconsin
White 301 294
Black 272 254
Hispanic 277 268

[sbMKE]

Milwaukee’s public schools boast rates of 50%+ perpetually truant and a graduation rate down near 40%. The rest of the state must be really really smart.

[Wayne07]

I was hoping someone would bring some facts to that claim, but unfortunately that blog post fails to do it. It doesn't validate whether it is true that those are the only states that don't have collective bargaining, and it doesn't address the combined sat/act scores, which is what the original claim says.

Best info I have found is here, but it doesn't directly address the facts in the claim.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/sep/02/randi-weingarten/randi-weingarten-says-students-strong-union-states/

[buwaya]

The best analysis would be to consider race-disaggregated results by state.

From what I have seen in the NAEP data, I think these would lead to rather surprising conclusions.

[buwaya]

The best analysis would be to consider race-disaggregated results by state.

From what I have seen in the NAEP data, I think these would lead to rather surprising conclusions.

[meyer]

Dig a little bit deeper and you’ll see that Virginia ranks higher than Wisconsin. Go to the link within the link that takes you to the ACT test web site and study the data a bit. Sort the data by composite score.

You’ll note that the northeast states tend to score highest on the composite, but they also have a much lower percentage of graduating students that actually get tested. Conversely, look at the end of the chart with the lowest scores and you’ll see a much higher rate of participation. Meaning that in general (with some exceptions, of course) the states with the best ACT scores tended to test the “cream of the crop” while states that tested all graduating students had their scores pulled downward by the more mediocre performers.

I’d bet that there’s no correlation between collective bargaining and student scores, and if there is, it’s probably a negative correlation. That is, students in big city schools with strong unions probably perform worse than students in smaller, rural schools that don’t have strong unions.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks crescen7.

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