Friday, November 06, 2015

Black students more likely to be suspended by MCPS than by Texas schools

Everything's bigger in Texas - except racial disparities in public school discipline policies, apparently. A new study by Texas Appleseed helps provide further context to a recent report that showed African-American students in Montgomery County Public Schools are 3 times as likely to be suspended from school as white and Asian students.

In Texas, there are also racial disparities in school discipline. But the Texas Appleseed report, titled "Suspended Childhood", found that black students in that state are less likely to be suspended than black students in Montgomery County. Black students in Texas are more than 2 times as likely to be suspended as whites - not laudable, but lower than in MCPS schools.

Montgomery County should consider this comparison, and some of the recommendations in this report, as it continues to struggle with a growing achievement gap. A 2014 County Office of Legislative Oversight report confirmed that MCPS had declined, and the achievement gap had widened, since 2010.

Now we know that Montgomery County students also fared poorly on this year's PARCC exams, the scores of which determined less than half of MCPS high school students are ready for college-level work.

And that superintendent search? Yeah, that search. They'll get around to it. Maybe some of the WMATA runners-up will give it go. The Montgomery County Council and Board of Education have made slouching a science.

35 comments:

Anonymous said...

It would be nice to see a bigger dataset so we can see the relevance of 3x more likely from one state to one county. What's the norm across the country or world? (Not that it should be the norm)

Anonymous said...

Well at least he linked to statistics and data and sources this time around. :)

Anonymous said...

The reality is that ANY student regardless of race needs to behave. The data is just nonsense and does not take into consideration many diffenerences between texas (a state) and MoCo (a county). Leave race out of it. This is just another racist study designed to fuel a fire that should not exist in 2015. End Racism.

Anonymous said...

5:35 You are a real oxymoron first you want to ignore the factor of race in this study, then you attack the comparative bodies in the study. Yes, it would be Shangri-la to have all students play nice, not happening, never will. Then you want to end racism. Can't have your cake and eat it too dude. Get over yourself, racism is real, whether it overt or covert. You come off as a closet racist.

Anonymous said...

You're too old to be living in your mom's basement.

Anonymous said...

Once again, Dyer shows himself to be hilariously innumerate.

Dyer: "A recent report...showed African-American students in Montgomery County Public Schools are 3 times as likely to be suspended from school as white and Asian students...the Texas Appleseed report, titled "Suspended Childhood", found that black students in that state are less likely to be suspended than black students in Montgomery County. Black students in Texas are more than 2 times as likely to be suspended as whites - not laudable, but lower than in MCPS schools."

From the Texas study: "Black students make up about 13% of the elementary school population in Texas, but they account for 42% of all Pre-K through 5th grade out-of-school suspensions."

Three times 13% is 39%. 42% is greater than three times 13%.

Congratulations, Dyer, you birdbrain. You got the statistics exactly backwards.

Anonymous said...

Why are you comparing Montgomery County, MD to Texas? Are you sure you're comparing to the right Montgomery County? There are Montgomery Counties in Texas, Virginia, Pennsylvania, in fact I think there are a total of at least 18 "Montgomery" Counties in the United States

Robert Dyer said...

10:18: You're the birdbrain - look at the report, and it says exactly what I said - more than two times as likely. If it was more than 3 times, the authors would have said that in bold print, as it would have made their case that much stronger.

Robert Dyer said...

12:28: Because Texas, which is cleaning our clock in economic development, is so often criticized by Maryland politicians for supposedly being far inferior to us in education and schools. How shocking it is, then, to find that racial disparities in MCPS are greater than in Texas. Very newsworthy, and part of a growing stack of damning evidence that our elected officials are failing the children of Montgomery County - and aren't capable of solving the problems.

Robert Dyer said...

By the way - why would you question which Montgomery County? I linked to a report that was specifically about racial disparities in Montgomery County, Maryland!

Anonymous said...

Robert @ 12:44PM
Because, as usual, to them it's more about giving you a hard time than actually caring about the issue at hand. Sad.

Anonymous said...

Yes and no. :)

Sad indeed that Dyer still doesn't get it.

Robert Dyer said...

1:52: What don't I get? Are you disputing the conclusions of the Texas Appleseed and MoCo reports I linked to?

Anonymous said...

Please try actually reading to what you link.

Here is Dyer's claim: "Black students in Texas are more than 2 times as likely to be suspended as whites."

From the Texas study: "Black students make up about 13% of the elementary school population in Texas, but they account for 42% of all Pre-K through 5th grade out-of-school suspensions."

Yes. More than 2 times as likely. Also more than THREE times as likely.

Do you not understand that 42% is more than three times 13%?

So in other words, the disparity in suspensions in Texas is GREATER than that in MoCo.

Anonymous said...

"...Texas, which is cleaning our clock in economic development..."

Not with oil at $40 a barrel.

Anonymous said...

"Birdbrain"? That's a term I'm sure used by many of your professional journalist peers. As with previous posters comments, exercising a little self restraint will go a long way in increasing your credibility when compared to your "competitors"

Anonymous said...

Would love to hear about all of the "credible" Dyer competitors. Patch? That out of date when published rag The Sentinel? The Post's couple of Bethesda articles per year? Get real.

Wrol said...

Isn't Dyer the one always talking about being held to a higher standard? Yet his defense and his defenders simply repeat the same rhetoric that the other newspapers and blogs did this or that.

Robert Dyer said...

3:12: If that was the conclusion of the data Texas Appleseed used, then they would have said "more than three times". They did not. They said more than two times. So did every other media outlet that reported on the study. Are you calling the study authors and the reporters in question morons?

Robert Dyer said...

3:31: Everyone can see it was the commenter who called me "birdbrain". I await your criticism of his comment. In fact, I've been addressed in more vulgar terms by your so-called "professional journalists", and have the emails to prove it. Stop trolling.

Robert Dyer said...

3:26: Texas has surpassed California in tech exports - no oil necessary.

Anonymous said...

@ 4:32 PM - Sounds like you didn't bother to read the actual numbers cited in in the Texas report. You stopped reading as soon as you thought that you had found your "gotcha, MoCo Machine" quote.

@ 4:36 PM - Stop being a birdbrain.

Anonymous said...

They emailed you unsolicited vulgarities? Sweet can we see them? We want the proof! This is turning awesome.

Anonymous said...

"Unsolicited Vulgarities" sounds like the name of a late-night talk show.

Anonymous said...

The Beaters are far from credible. Slanted coverage heavily influenced by the likes of EYA, Hull's personal plagiarism of a number of Dyer's stories, fake "best of" awards to loyal advertisers, shall I go on?
Not the stuff of credibility.
In Dyer we trust.

Anonymous said...

@5:08PM - Where are the personal attacks in the BB comments? No one is calling any of those writers "birdbrain" or threatening with baseball bats.
Again, I've just checked over 30 and didn't see those types of comments.
Moot point.

Anonymous said...

Figured my post about "the beat" would get deleted, birdbrain!

Robert Dyer said...

5:04: I read the whole report. The "gotcha quote" is near the end of the report.

Anonymous said...

@ 9:15 PM -

Well, thanks for confirming that you were in fact referring to the same sentence as I was, and that you can't make meaningful comparisons between even two numbers.

From the Texas report, page "Black students make up only 13% of the elementary school-age population (Pre-K through 5th grade) in Texas schools, they account for 42% of out-of-school suspensions."

42% is more than three times 13%, and much more than "twice". Two times 13% is 26%, and three times 13% is 39%.

So, in once again, the racial disparity in suspensions in the state of Texas is GREATER than that for Montgomery County.

Innumerate birdbrain.

Anonymous said...

Odd how Dyer deleted the comment which referred indirectly to his competition, rather than the one about "fried chicken".

It would seem that Dyer hates his competition more than he loves the minorities of Montgomery County.

Robert Dyer said...

1:04: You're the one who didn't read the whole report. You're grabbing some numbers from the early pages and trying to create an alternative conclusion. Read the whole report, and you'll eventually get to the actual authors' statement that blacks are "twice as likely" to be suspended in Texas, vs. "three times as likely" in MoCo, per the MoCo report I cited. Stick with it. You can do it.

Robert Dyer said...

7:01: That was posted since I checked comments last and has been deleted.

Anonymous said...

The report does not in fact read as you have written. What it states: "Overall, Black students were more than twice as likely to receive out-of-school suspensions as White students during the 2013-2014 school year."

Note the "more than twice as likely." As noted earlier above, the rate is in fact more than three times as likely using the data provided in the Texas report.

Steve D. said...

The report data is meaningless anyway without some breakdown of how socioeconomic status may influence the suspension rate. For all we know the lion's share of the suspensions could be occurring in handful of schools in distressed economic environments.

Robert Dyer said...

8:04: So, your theory is that the professionals who authored the report are so moronic that they downplayed the severity of the problem, and went with a less-powerful "more than twice"? And that your anonymous comment carries more weight than the actual report and other media outlets who all concluded Texas black students were "more than twice as likely to be suspended"? Yeah, okay. Anonymous comments are always a reliable source, for sure ...