HISD Magnet Statistics

I've heard some opinions from Mary Nesbitt (HISD District Advisory Committee Member), Maggie Solomon, Judy Long, Ann Blackwood (HISD Parent Engagement Committee Members) and Ed Klein (Greater Houston Partnership) floating around in emails and on the Viewpoints page of a local weekly. The gist of their argument is that by making changes to magnet transportation, HISD is potentially removing large amounts of funding from magnet programs. While they may be correct in the worst case, I believe that their argument is incomplete; and that's perhaps intentional, as a complete analysis would diminish the alarm they seem to profess in their writing.

Let me be clear. I am opposed to HISD making transportation changes for the 2009-2010 year for magnet students, but for different reasons, which I outlined in an earlier post. What I'm objecting to is this use of statistical information to try to create an extreme reaction, which in my opinion, makes it more difficult to enter this discussion on a collaborative basis. Let me say how I disagree with the conclusions in the email/article.

First, the facts. They are, unfortunately, not simple to corroborate. The authors claim a student is worth $3446.00 in funding to the school they attend; let's accept that on face value. The authors also seem to know exactly how many students at various schools must travel 10+ miles to attend; I have been unable to date to get this information from HISD, so I'll assume they have direct access to information I can't corroborate.

Next, the analysis. Given the number of 10+ mile travelers in each magnet program, the authors make a straightforward calculation on how much funding the school would lose if those riders were unable to attend; they multiply the number of students by $3446 and report the result. For example, Lamar HS, with 230 affected students, would potentially lose $792,580.00; Westside HS, with about 400 affected students, would lose $1,374,954.00. Those are big numbers, and would cause a big disruption; the program would have to curtail staff and possibly faculty to meet the shortfall. Overall, the nearly 3400 affected students would represent over $11,500,000.00 in funding at stake.

But it's only half the story. Their analysis assumes that the magnet programs would not be able to find new students to attend, which is almost certainly not the case. I called Lanier MS (163 affected students) and found out that each year 600 applicants qualify for 235 spots. If students 10+ miles away were unable to attend, it would affect those directly (which I would argue is a worse effect), but is unlikely to affect the program at Lanier much. For Johnston MS (206 affected students), a similar situation; they receive on the order of 1000 applicants for 250 spots. TH Rogers MS receives several hundred applicants for 75 open spots. Carnegie HS (141 students affected) has several hundred applicants for 150 spots. Westside HS, with a huge 399 students potentially affected, admits 120-200 per year, of around 400 qualified applicants. Again, a transportation disruption could have a huge affect on the students, but may or may not cause the programs to see the financial reductions the authors describe.

I think there are already plenty of reasons to ask HISD to postpone or amend any changes to transportation for magnet students. I just think this reported analysis is sloppy, and should be disregarded.