UPDATE: Newsweek has admitted that it blew it, and White Station High School is now #1,090 out of the top 1,600 high schools in the entire U.S.
The written statement from Jay Mathews, Researcher and Contributing Editor with Newsweek Magazine:
“Newsweek made a big mistake in leaving White Station High School off of its 2010 Best High Schools list. We had an out of date contact for the school and should have worked harder to get to them after they did not respond to our messages. We are gathering their data now and expect to be adding them to the list in our July update. We apologize for our error. We better do much better next time. —Jay Mathews, Newsweek contributing editor
Yesterday’s post:
Most of us who keep up with school issues were surprised to see that White Station High School was not on Newsweek magazine’s list of top U.S. schools. According to its principal, David Mansfield, it’s because of an error by the magazine. A member of Memphis City Schools communications staff sent the following to school board members today:
Dear Board Commissioners,
On behalf of Superintendent Cash, I am sending an update on White Station High and Newsweek’s list of America’s Best High School.
After researching why White Station High School was not on the Newsweek list of America’s Best High Schools, we have learned that the magazine failed to include the “Challenge Index” score of White Station High School in its calculation of America’s Best High Schools. We are not able to detect why this omission occurred, however, Newsweek has provided us an opportunity to correct the error by allowing the school’s administration to contact Jay Mathews, Researcher Newsweek Magazine to inform him of the error, and the magazine will seek to resolve the issue.
Having appeared on the list of America’s Best High Schools since 2007, White Station’s 2010 ranking index of 1.4936 will likely place the school in the top 1,100 schools and above local schools, Collierville High and Houston High.
According to College Board sources, White Station’s AP passing rate — a substantial 76.7% — is among the highest in the region.
Below is the text of an email sent to Newsweek’s Jay Mathews from White Station High School’s principal, David Mansfield:
I am the principal of White Station High School in Memphis, TN. We were on the Newsweek list of America’s Best High Schools in 2007, 2008, 2009 but were not on the list this year. After reviewing the formula you use to calculate the Challenge Index and our data for the 2009 school year, I believe White Station High School should have made the 2010 list with a 1.4936 Index. This would place us at about number 1090 on the list.
Here is our data for your review:
AP exams given – 708
AP exam pass rate – 76.7%
Number of graduating seniors – 474
708/474 = 1.4936
Please note that we do not offer International Baccalaureate (IB) or Cambridge tests at our school.
To ensure accuracy of the data presented above, please note that the Advanced Placement test and pass rate data was provided by the College Board and the number of graduating seniors was provided by the Tennessee Department of Education.
Please review the White Station High School data and make any corrections to your list that are appropriate.
With thanks,
Principal
White Station High School
As a White Station alum, I was shocked to see my school was not on Newsweek’s list. I heard things that changed at the school since I graduated in 2003 but I didn’t think it had changed that much. I hope that it truly is an error.
You sure they didn’t figure out how unfair your system for getting and excluding students was unbelievably unfair?
You sure they didn’t get a sneak peek at those practices and chose not to engage in what you are doing at White Station?
Maybe they looked at the whole system’s dynamics and saw that the whole system is unfairly slanted against MOST of the schools. Maybe they see White Station as a haven for discriminatory practices considering how many other schools IN THE SAME PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM, MCS, are failing worse than most schools in the US and didn’t want to partake in this farce anymore.
Maybe the truth hit them, maybe the word is OUT!
Zippy, I know from some of your other comments that you are too smart to believe that MCS is the only district to employ what are often referred to as “magnet schools” in their system. With that in mind, it is as fair a comparison and ranking as anything else Newsweek produces.
MCS is the ONLY place I’ve seen the practices that pass as fair and normal here be the abhorrent practices that should not exist anywhere.
I don’t know of any other place in America where you stand in line all day and night to attempt to get your kid in what you THINK is a school that will provide a quality education, in a system that doesn’t know how many kids are enrolled, where teachers can block your child from attending better schools by “computer foulups” with report cards that don’t get fixed.
How does that affect those student’s self esteem?
It makes the students think that their grades are not important.
I’ve never seen a system that complained so much about parents not getting involved in their kid’s school and then block the parents from actually accomplishing participation in the improvement of schools.
I’ve never seen a school system with only 100,000 students receive a billion dollars a year in budget, and not be able to provide air conditioning and heating, ceilings that haven’t fallen in, not be able to paint the buildings, not have any quality landscaping, not have bathrooms you can’t smell from outside the building with painted over rusted bathroom fixtures, not have the right books or books at all in some cases, not be able to keep qualified good teachers teaching in the classroom, not afford teachers aids, call for charter schools that are veiled “reform schools” instead of actual educational facilities attempting to actually educate the student there.
Then to pay that Ivy League Price per student and get the WORST results in the nation, well. Why not just spit in everyone’s eye?
They did, they said it was all about the pensions. Spit, right in your eye!
If the MCS budget is paying pensions, you have the stupidest accountant and financial planner in recorded history.
People would like to think that MCS is typical of the nations public school systems and they even spend money on keeping that perception alive, because it’s cheaper to spend that money than it is to find out WHERE THAT BILLION DOLLARS IS REALLY GOING TO.
The perception is a lie. Spit in your eye.
Oh, and yeah, I know about magnet schools in other states, and they are much more fairly attracting kids with talent, where yours are excluding everyone they can. MCS criteria excludes children from development and advancement.
WHY?
Because you have 120 schools and everybody who cares wants their kids in less than 10 of those, because the other 115 are an abysmal wreck due to lack of effective oversight and parents being blocked from effective participation.
They also reject students who have valid medical reasons and signed doctor’s recommendations from being put in a school more conducive to their health, i.e. better records of low violence and better academic opportunities.
My child is a rising 9th grader about to enter White Station High School. I have been told by two male students (one a rising junior, one a rising senior) that they “never” use the bathrooms at White Station High School. Not EVER. Why? Because they are disgustingly dirty and there are no doors on the stalls. Period. So, if you have to take a crap, you’d have to sit on germ-infested toilets and hope nobody comes in to look at you.
I find this information absolutely appalling. One of the sources of this info is a boy whom is trustworthy and who I’ve known for a while. He said that a 9th grader started a petition last year about the bathroom conditions, but nobody knows if it went on deaf ears. He said that the principal is AWFUL and simply only cares about what the public thinks … and doesn’t really care about the students.
One of the boy’s parents allegedly tried to work with the principal to rectify the bathroom situation, but then told their son it was “hopeless”. This is a parent-couple where the mom is typically very active in PTAs/PTOs.
This is ridiculous and I hope that the information I’ve gained is inaccurate OR is going to be rectified by the time my child starts school there. Otherwise, I think some of the media will get a nice little webcam spy to enter those bathrooms and provide them with plenty of ammo. And, the nearby million dollar homeowners might have a lot to worry about, too, if things don’t get taken care of quickly and quietly. Their property values will PLUMMET.
Word to the wise … I don’t back down. If you are reading this, you should alert the WSHS principal that there is a rogue parent who will not put up with indecent animal treatment of children when it comes to basic bathroom needs. He should be very afraid because his name will be called upon first as the source of the problem no matter if he causes the problem or not. Ultimately, the buck stops with HIM.
And, so should WSHS go back on the Newsweek list for 2011?? If the bathroom situation doesn’t shape up INSTANTLY, I will insure that it does NOT. In fact, Newsweek might be the ones who get the WEBCAM sent to them. Directly. From the anonymous ones.