Maryland public schools ranked top in the nation for the second year in a row, according to a national survey released Wednesday by Education Week magazine.
Virginia public schools ranked fourth in the nation, and D.C. public and charter schools took their familiar spot at the bottom of the heap.
The report, titled Quality Counts 2010, surveyed factors from pre-kindergarten participation to adults in the work force, but focused most heavily on performance and standards at the K-12 level.
Despite their top rankings, Maryland and Virginia’s bragging rights were held in check by their overall grades: a “B+” in Maryland and a “B-” in Virginia, compared with a “C” national average. The District scored a disappointing “D+,” with a notable “F” in K-12 achievement, one of the survey’s six subcategories based mostly on 2007 data.
“Performance [nationwide] is not where we’d like it to be,” said Chris Swanson, director of Editorial Projects in Education, the firm responsible for the research.
Maryland scored its highest marks for the work it has done ensuring academic alignment from pre-kindergarten through college or the work force. In other words, a student who spends all of his school years in the state should not hit a grade or a class for which he’s under- or overprepared.
Virginia’s top marks came for its statewide standards for what students ought to know at each grade level and for its ability to reward good schools and change the bad ones.
One weak spot showed up for Maryland and Virginia — both fell below the national average on the quality and rigor of their standardized tests. Those tests are used to determine schools’ and districts’ status under the national No Child Left Behind law. Weak tests can allow achievement to look good on paper even as students fail to master material.
“Our work did not end with last year’s ranking, and it doesn’t end today,” said Maryland State Superintendent Nancy Grasmick.
The District’s recent improvements on standardized tests and its graduation rate bumped its overall score, but not enough to erase continued dismal performance on national measures of math and reading.
In all states, the survey failed to account for some reforms put in place this year that would have improved overall results — performance pay in Maryland’s Prince George’s County, for example, or new teacher evaluations in D.C. Public Schools.
