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Which Maryland middle schools have been most successful

with Special Education populations in math?


One of the areas of concern that we have identified in our schools is the assessment of
special education students, particularly in math. Deep Creek and other schools
especially struggled in the sub group of special education and math. We are interested
in the concept of data mining in order to improve the education for our struggling
population. Data mining offers an opportunity for schools to analyze their classrooms,
teachers and practices in order to compare them to the best performing schools and
their best practices.

The purpose for the data below is to look at the top performing middle schools in the
state of Maryland in regards to special education mathematics in order to analyze the
numbers to decide how data mining could be used to support special education classes
within our schools.

You will be asked to consider the following prompts:

 What additional information would you need from teachers, students,


parents, administrators and community in order to analyze this data
and why?
 Is this a fair comparison of the data? Why or Why not?
 Where does you school compare to these top schools? What two
things would you suggest for your school to do to improve in the
test scores in the area of special ed?
 How could data mining strategies help special ed teams working to
improve their test scores?

Data taken from: http://mdk12.org/

Subject:

Schools in:

Pop:

Grade Band:

GRAPH MY CHOICES >>


CONSIDER THE DATA IN THE CHART BELOW:
2009 MSA Mathematics
State of Maryland Middle schools most successful with Special Education student population.

% Proficient and Advanced Special Education Test


Special Education All Students Takers
% % County School Name % #
19
94.7 90.3 Washington Hancock Middle Senior High 12.3
154
30
93.3 72.4 Baltimore City Fallstaff Elementary 13.8
217
40
90.0 72.7 Baltimore City Woodhome Elementary/Middle 13.5
297
35
85.7 87.5 Montgomery Takoma Park Middle School 4.4
792
52
82.7 90.5 Anne Arundel Severn River Middle 6.3
828
56
82.1 94.0 Worcester Stephen Decatur Middle 8.8
637
39
82.1 92.9 Allegany Westmar Middle 13.8
283
29
79.3 79.4 Baltimore City Rosemont Elementary 11.7
247
29
79.3 92.3 Howard Ellicott Mills Middle 4.1
705
121
78.5 95.9 Montgomery Thomas W. Pyle Middle School 9.7
1248
23
78.3 86.2 Baltimore City Holabird Elementary 21.1
109
105
78.1 96.5 Montgomery Herbert Hoover Middle 10.7
985
67
77.6 94.7 Baltimore Hereford Middle 6.7
1002
44
77.3 85.6 Baltimore City Franklin Square Elementary 20.5
215
26
76.9 98.6 Howard Clarksville Middle 3.6
715
64
76.6 72.2 Baltimore Woodlawn Middle 10.2
625
81
75.3 90.2 Montgomery North Bethesda Middle 10.4
778
40
75.0 86.3 Baltimore City Thomas Johnson Elementary 21.1
190
16
75.0 88.2 Washington Clear Spring Middle 3.8
417
35
74.3 94.6 Howard Hammond Middle School 6.1
573

Also consider the following excerpt from this week’s readings when
responding to the prompts:

Enhancing Learning Environments Through Solution-based Knowledge Discovery


Tools: Forecasting for Self-perpetuating Systemic Reform
Page 18-19
Data Mining for Schools
“If data mining allows the business and medical sector to accurately identify and predict
the most effective way to deliver their respective services, shouldn’t educators understand
how to use their data to match (a) instruction to student, (b) teacher style to learner needs,
and (c) learning environment to student requirements? Shouldn’t administrators mine
school or district data for the characteristics of the most successful classes, teachers,
pedagogy, schedule, or other variables that identify a significant pattern? Students bring
additional variables to the classroom and it is sometimes difficult to sift through patterns
of interestingness, as described above, and use these patterns to inform instruction.
Guttentag and Clark (1999) have documented the impact of information overload in a
variety of education settings. Their findings sound an alert that schools are drowning in
the hundreds of daily transactions including attendance, student and teacher schedules,
and individual student assignments. A student carries with him or her historical data,
random sets of demographic information, standardized test scores, unique family
situations, health records, extra curricular participation, and grades. Each student also
interacts with teachers, administrators, academic specialists and career counselors who in
turn have their own data histories with details such as salary, educational attainment,
certification and professional development in addition to regional, school-based, and
student domains.”

When discussing the data above, consider the following prompt questions:
(repeat of the prompts above on 1st page)

 What additional information would you need from teachers, students,


parents, administrators and community in order to analyze this data
and why?
 Is this a fair comparison of the data? Why or Why not?
 Where does you school compare to these top schools? What two
things would you suggest for your school to do to improve in the
test scores in the area of special ed?
 How could data mining strategies help special ed teams working to
improve their test scores?

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