By: Diane Benjamin
Before your kids go back to school, review how schools did in the one job they have – EDUCATION. Your kids only get one chance to learn what they need to be successful! The below stats are for area high schools, keep in mind students got here by being in public schosol for more than a decade.
The below are results of the 2021-2022 school year, new stats for 2022-2023 will be out in October.
One would think U-High would have excellent education results since they get to pick their students.
https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/school.aspx?source=trends&Schoolid=651089010800001
13% of graduates need community college remediation with a graduation rate is 99%. Proficiency rates in English Language Arts, Math and Science are all below 70%. Compared to the State however the kids are geniuses! ELA and Math for the state are below 30%, Science is 50%
Jump over to Bloomington High School: https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/school.aspx?source=trends&Schoolid=170640870250001
39% of graduates need community college remediation with a graduation rate of only 80%. Chronic absenteeism is 50%. 39% of students are chronically truant while the dropout rate is only 4%. Proficiency in ELA and Math are below State standards, Science is 6 points above the state average.
Normal West: https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/school.aspx?schoolid=170640050260002
27% need community college remediation, graduation rate is 89%. 34% are chronically absent. 21% are chronically truant. Proficiency in ELA and Math are slightly above state averages, science is higher than the state average.
Normal Community: https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/school.aspx?source=studentcharacteristics&Schoolid=170640050260001
30% of graduates need community college remediation with a graduation rate of 91%. 31% are chronically absent, 25% are chronically truant. ELA, Math and Science are all above state averages.
Lots of other data is also available for each school.
All area public schools are available on this site. It will be interesting to compare these numbers to what gets published in October. Why are chronically absent and truant numbers so high? Parents don’t care?
Stay tuned for October.
first off it is not parents anymore a lot of the students households consist of one parent and that parent is either at work or busy making more kids and can’t be bothered with those children that they currently have. This has been building for years and any one that thinks it is going to get better is just fooling themselves.
The family unit is no longer it has been in decline for years. And yes there are single family households where the parent is doing their best to keep their children in check but that is not the norm.
Until those that can’t take care of one child stop making more as I said above there will be no solution to not only absenteeism but crime will do nothing but continue to grow.
Call me negative nellie but I am just calling it as I see it.
Thanks Diane! When you pull out the numbers for the Black and Brown populations the failure rate is sadly jaw dropping. School has become a waste of time and money for many students. It’s probably the reason for the high truancy.
What a disservice the schools are committing when they blame and teach that some are purposefully blocked from succeeding because of racism, white supremacy, oppression, dominance, shade of skin and America. Why would anyone go to that kind of school?
Raises hand. I am a parent of a “chronically absent” Dist 87 student. Not because our kiddo doesn’t care or is busy slinging dope, playing video games or stealing stuff. Instead it is medical and developmental specialists: speech & physical therapy, optomitrists and other vision specialists, orthotic peeps (including fittings for devices), a surgery and related pre- and post-procedure appointments, pediatrician appts… you get the idea. Oh yeah, and you’re supposed to keep your crumb cruncher home with 100.3+ fever. So yeah, swnd the truancy officer out to my house and I will tell them to go self-procreate. Not all kiddos have perfect attendance as I had at least four or five of my public school years when Igrew up.
Showing up is 80 percent of life. I don’t see how we can blame our schools for some of the things they are accused of not teaching when you have this many students who are chronically absent and truant. They don’t need community college remediation, they need high school remediation.
My experience as a Unit 5 parent is that when students are adequately supported at home, they succeed in school. Where we have gotten into trouble in this community, indeed our nation, is when the schools try to take over being parents to students.
@Unwoke. Good point, but. The schools have caused a logjam of failure. For example, when 60-80% of a senior class of 500 students fails and has to repeat the year, that means that all those students are added to the class that follows them. You immediately overload the system. What is their solution?
Pass them anyway and let someone else (junior colleges or the work force) deal with it.
Maybe we should just allow those entering their junior year an opt out choice. If you don’t care and know you are going to fail anyway, you can have a “junior high” school diploma.
Get them out of a high school system that can’t help them. They can get a job or live off their parents. At least they won’t be wasting everyone’s time and money. This is more honest than what the high schools are doing now. And at least you put it out there that if you don’t care neither do we.
So does truancy and absenteeism include “approved” absences like doctor’s appointments or days that kids are forced to stay home because they have a fever? I don’t doubt that these numbers are high, but are they accurate and inflated? I could see the truancy numbers being higher because like most parents if my kids need an appointment, I am more than likely to schedule it in the morning. Just wondering.