by James C. Sherlock

This is part 3 of my recent series on Loudoun County schools in general and its high schools in particular. It will confirm what we have already discussed.

I will here compare Loudoun schools in 2018-19 math SOL performance (last year pre-COVID) and other metrics with the schools in Virginia Beach. A spreadsheet with the data for each is posted that includes the same data for Wise County.

Take a look. It is rendered as a heat map. Dark green is outstanding and dark red is bad. The comparison is with statewide averages. The rest of the palette is rendered accordingly.

Loudoun residents won’t like the outcome.

In parts 1 and 2 I showed with state data that Loudoun County high schools greatly outspent and yet underperformed the schools in Wise County in the Virginia coalfields  There are specific Loudoun high schools that drove down the overall results.

The identical comparison between Loudoun and Virginia Beach high schools yielded the same results.

Exactly.

You will note on the spreadsheet that Virginia Beach and Loudoun schools from 2nd through 12th grade posted virtually equal pass rates in math SOLs in 2018-19.

But by the time Virginia Beach kids are in high school, they far surpass their Loudoun counterparts. Four of the Loudoun high schools had math SOL pass rates below the lowest of the Virginia Beach high schools and much lower than the state average.

That means the Virginia Beach kids started out behind and finished well ahead —  a learning curve slope for which every school system strives.

Loudoun, not so much.

DEI in Virginia Beach Schools

Virginia Beach particularly dazzled with the absolutely outstanding math SOL performances of its Black, Hispanic, economically disadvantaged and English learner high schoolers.

The Virginia Beach school board, like that of Loudoun, has said its school system is systemically racist. It has been hiring diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) managers, forming DEI committees hand picked to view with alarm, re-training its teachers to fix their flawed characters and changing “inequitable” policies as fast as it can.

Dr. LaQuiche R. Parrott is the Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Well done. Hard to figure out what she will fix, but easy to see what she may break.

Test results show that many minority and poor kids in Virginia Beach high schools posted what are statistically likely to be the best SOL results in the state.

Those kids may have to slow down in their academic pursuits to make “equity” less of a reality so it can be “repaired” by the school board and its race industry hires.

The school board needs to look up and smell the roses.

And stop driving away the very teachers who helped their students achieve these results just a couple of years ago. They love helping minority and impoverished kids succeed, and they are demonstrably wonderful at it.

But we will excuse them if they don’t appreciate being insulted for their efforts.

Leadership

The Loudoun school board, the superintendent’s office, the principals’ offices and classroom teachers and their counterparts in Virginia Beach are equally responsible for the results in their high schools.

As a citizen of Virginia Beach and the father and grandfather of kids who went to school here, I am proud of our schools.

I just hope the current school board doesn’t wreck them.

As for the Loudoun County school board and superintendent’s office, if you made excuses among yourselves when the comparison with Wise County made you look incompetent and not a little ridiculous, you are now going to have to try to explain the Virginia Beach comparison.

Good luck.