Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2006 > September > 07 > Entry
Richest to poorest school districts ranked
Since my story earlier this week on income and test scores I’ve had several request for the full list of data — each district’s Dayton-area rank for income and test performance.
So here it is:
These are the 82 districts in Darke, Shelby, Miami, Champaign, Clark, Preble, Montgomery, Greene, Warren and Butler counties, ranked from wealthiest to poorest for median income (from the state’s tax return data). I’ve also blogged on this issue here.
The number in parenthesis is the district’s Dayton-area rank (out of 82 districts) for performance index score, the state’s measure of test performance across all grades. The dollar figure is the district’s median income.
(9) Springboro $57,708
(1) Oakwood $56,825
(2) Mason $56,322
(15) Lakota $50,067
(6) Sugarcreek $49,097
(13) Beavercreek $46,355
(22) Little Miami $45,842
(3) Centerville $44,353
(7) Kings $40,994
(33) Monroe $39,683
(42) Bethel $38,722
(12) Tipp City $37,647
(27) Lebanon $36,815
(31) Ross $36,683
(26) Fairfield $36,028
(39) Greenon $36,002
(14) Northmont $35,957
(10) Anna $35,758
(19) Wayne $35,704
(48) Northeastern $35,646
(55) Madison $35,486
(37) Valley View $35,477
(63) Triad $35,173
(24) Miamisburg $34,649
(47) Huber Heights $34,491
(44) Edgewood $34,431
(20) Yellow Springs $34,268
(16) West Liberty-Salem $33,945
(11) Fort Loramie $33,943
(40) Miami East $33,735
(5) Russia $33,733
(74) Jackson Center $33,711
(8) Vandalia Butler $33,584
(57) Carlisle $33,160
(69) Mechanicsburg $32,911
(54) Graham $32,905
(23) Kettering $32,883
(21) Newton $32,878
(36) Southeastern $32,862
(28) Brookville $32,819
(45) Greenview $32,684
(41) Clark-Shawnee $32,496
(38) Tri-County North $32,378
(51) Northwestern $32,339
(67) Preble-Shawnee $32,271
(29) Talawanda $32,179
(4) Botkins $32,123
(32) Troy $31,893
(60) Twin Valley $31,823
(52) Eaton $31,639
(25) Frankin-Monroe $31,484
(49) Hardin-Houston $31,244
(35) Covington $31,086
(17) Versallies $30,953
(18) Cedar Cliff $30,626
(34) Arcanum-Butler 30,476
(30) Milton-Union 30,423
(46) New Lebanon 30,205
(68) West Carrollton 29,923
(66) Frankin 29,594
(61) Tecumseh 29,557
(50) Fairlawn 29,528
(81) Jefferson Twp. 29,282
(72) Xenia 29,104
(77) Bradford 28,935
(64) National Trail 28,876
(75) Tri-Village 28,607
(62) Urbana 28,569
(53) Ansonia 28,006
(59) Sidney 27,986
(70) Fairborn 27,569
(58) Mad River 26,811
(71) Greenville 26,610
(65) Hamilton 26,349
(78) Middletown 25,956
(79) Trotwood-Madison 25,578
(56) Piqua 25,345
(73) Mississinawa Valley 25,329
(43) New Miami 25,053
(82) Dayton 23,047
(80) Springfield 22,543
(76) Northridge 22,384
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Testing
Comments
By Tammy
September 17, 2006 7:13 PM | Link to this
KdeRosa… you have no idea what you are talking about. My husband grew up poor with an IQ of 165 and graduated top of his class at the US Naval Academy. I’m the daughter of a disabled railroad worker. Dad may be poor, but he qualifies for Mensa! I teach in one of the 10 poorest schools in the state. We are rural. We have little tax base and our median income is extremely lower than the ones on your list. HOWEVER! Our school has outstanding test scores! ALWAYS I also taught in a very poor urban school in North Carolina for 8 years. That school, though the poorest in the area, had terrific test scores as well. Using Socio-economics as a scapegoat is terrible! Just because they have more to overcome does not mean the school system is off the hook. Poor does not equal stupid! In fact, I’ve had some pretty wealthy kids in classrooms who had the common sense of a garden snail. Having money also doesn’t make a good parent. I’ve seen a lot of wealthy kids with poor skills because mumsy and dadums are just too busy with their own lives. How many poor kids get shipped off to summer camp for 8 weeks so mommy doesn’t have to cope? How many poor kids end up in rehab at age 17 because they had enough money for blow but not enough attention from mumsy? Sure it’s a pain, but dedicated teachers can make it work with little or no support. Don’t have fancy two toned math counters? Spray paint lima beans! Don’t have fancy textbooks? GOOD! Studies have proven that textbook teaching is ineffective! I have 1 textbook in my classroom for reading and the kids only touch it when we need something to write on when we go out in the courtyard. Blaming the poor kids? What’s next? Oh I know… “We just CAN’T meet our science requirements. We have too many girls. Everybody knows girls don’t do well in science!”By Scott Elliott
September 11, 2006 8:58 AM | Link to this
Matt, for our story we correlated two values — median income and “performance index score” — for each district. I presented this list here at Get on the Bus with the ranking rather than the raw PI score just because I thought it would be easier to read.By Matt
September 11, 2006 12:36 AM | Link to this
Correlating a ranking and a value is completely meaningless. Use the test scores themselves, not the ranking. The difference between 2nd and 3rd is (probably) not the same as the difference between 47th and 48th.By Mary
September 9, 2006 7:52 AM | Link to this
However, old prof, there is a difference between correlation and cause and effect. When you find any correlation, you are implying that is the cause of good or bad performance. Maybe you should address the .28 that do not corelate, according to your figures.By Oldprof
September 8, 2006 3:39 PM | Link to this
Ah, data mining. Mary insists on “common sense” (which we all know is neither common nor sensible); Kara says there’s NO correlation, deRosa says sure there is. Let’s see some real numbers, such as: I get a .72 coefficient of correlation between school rank and income rank—high enough to take as evidence that there is a definite relationship. None of the schools in the top ten rank below the median income; none of the bottom ten schools rank above the median. Of the 83 districts in the list, 34 have a difference of ten or less between school and income rank. SURE, there are those who do more with less and those who do less with (relatively) more—but we’ve generally been working on a shoestring since the 1960s; just once it would be nice to be told to do more with more—not to mention that it’s an ethically consistent position.By Walt MIlls
September 8, 2006 8:22 AM | Link to this
Income figures for Springfield seem extremly low. Everything I find shows medisn household income in the high 30K range.By KDeRosa
September 8, 2006 8:05 AM | Link to this
The amount of money someone makes has nothing to do with the schools performance. That’s not right. Familial income is a measure of socioeconomic status (SES) and SES is correlated with student IQ, which strongly predicts student performance, at about 0.4. An even better of SES is parental education which correlated with student IQ at about 0.6. Not unsurprising, parental education correlates highly with familial income. Also, parental involvement increases as familial income and parental education increase.By Scott Elliott
September 7, 2006 2:21 PM | Link to this
J in Huber, that should have said Edgewood, a district in Butler County (fixed now). The Wayne school district is in Warren County.By kara
September 7, 2006 1:52 PM | Link to this
The amount of money someone makes has nothing to do with the schools performance. Parental involvement and drive make schools in other areas do better. I went to Dayton schools and would rather work 3 jobs than send my child to a Dayton/ Cincinnati public school. A lot of poor people live in my city and they scrimp and save to live here so their kids can go to a top rated school. They take responsiblity for their kid and their education.By J in Huber
September 7, 2006 1:50 PM | Link to this
I am confused by these ranking. I see Wayne and also see Huber Heights, which I guess means there is a Wayne school district but why is both Englewood and Northmont listed in the rankings? Please clarifyBy Mary
September 7, 2006 1:37 PM | Link to this
It appears, just as common sense would dictate, money drives performance only up to a point. While money or median income is a big discriminator between the best performers and the least performers and indicating an entirely different arena of life experiences, there comes a point within similar groups, money is not the issue with performance.