The problem with reading statistics like those in “A Public Education Primer” is that they generate more questions than they answer. I found myself repeatedly asking questions while reading the packet. For instance, after reading the statistic on page 6 about more public school students attend school in suburbs, towns, and in rural areas, I found myself asking, “Why are there less public school students in urban areas?” Then of course that lead to more questions… “Are there fewer children in urban areas than the other areas (which doesn’t make sense—higher population more kids, right?)? Do more children in urban areas go to private schools? Did the statistic refer to all three areas combined verses urban areas?” Another topic that I found interesting that triggered a lot of unanswered questions was on page 16. The statistic referred to the discrepancies between the schooling requirements in varies states. Sure they told me what some of the discrepancies were, such as required years of attendance and number of school days on a year, but they didn’t tell me how it affected the overall achievement of the students. I want to know if the students benefit by going to school for 186 days verses 173 or what the pros and cons are for the students that are required to attend school for 13 years verses those students who are required to stay in school for a lesser time. I also want to know why there is such a big discrepancy between varying states—Are the biggest discrepancies between the more agricultural states verses industrial ones?
Even more frustrating is when they list conflicting information for the same exact area of research. For instance, on page 28 they had conflicting information about the rate of high school completion. There was a fairly sizeable variance in the data between the four different groups who did the research. Why did it vary so much and which one is the closest to the truth? Or is it all true just with a little bit different spin on the numbers?
Do you see how I could make myself a little batty reading something like this? I could actually write for pages about all of the questions that popped into my mind, but I had very few answers…
1 comment:
I totally agree! I found myself questioning each statistic. What did any of them really tell me? I wanted to know how the %s compared with the %s of children in the total population. For example if 50% of children in urban areas attending public school are white, are 50% of all children in the area white and what are the percentages in non-public schools? Questions, questions, questions!
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