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Brookings Institution recently unveiled the Education Choice and Competition Index (ECCI). Its goal is to provide an “informative and consumer-relevant measure of the degree of choice and competition within the geographical boundaries of large school districts.”

This index considers this choice and competition a positive – the nation’s 25 largest school districts are given a letter grade, with an “A” representing the highest “quality” of choice, as determined by the developers’ framework of 13 categories, including the proportion of students enrolled in nontraditional public schools, the mechanism used to assign students to schools, and information available on-line regarding school performance and how to use the choice process.

As far as I can tell, only one of these 13 categories is a measure of quality – and it’s a reflection of the average public (traditional/charter/magnet) school within a district, weighted by the number of students enrolled at the school. While the developers do express concern over the quality of options available to parents, this measure did not appear to greatly impact rankings. For example, Chicago ranked second in the choice index. Yet it was tied for 23 out of 25 when it came to school quality.  

It’s a common frustration I have in arguments over school choice policy. Often, it seems the ultimate goal is ensuring choice, with quality concerns to be resolved by market forces. My view: If the options parents have aren’t high quality, how much does choice really matter?

Take New York City, which was the highest-ranked district in this index, in part because of its mechanism for assigning students to high schools – “eighth graders fill out high school applications ranking as many as 12 choices, and the high schools, in turn, rank applicants based on their portfolios, test scores, geographic proximity and other factors. A computer then matches students to high schools.”

Yet last spring, the New York Times ran a story, profiling Radcliffe Saddler, who was at the time an eighth grade student in the running to be valedictorian of his NYC middle school. He didn’t get into any of the schools he applied to. And he wasn’t alone. That article pointed out:

The Department of Education’s dizzying, byzantine system for students to select a public high school left a total of 8,239 — about 10 percent of the city’s eighth graders — shut out of all their choices, and their parents feeling inadequate, frustrated and angry.

It also pointed to research showing that “black and Hispanic students in the city in 2008 tended to rank better-performing schools outside their neighborhood as their first choice, but more often ended up being accepted at local schools more like their middle schools.”

Researchers acknowledged that “it was impossible … for every student to go to a school better than his or her middle school, since there were only a small number of competitive high schools.”

And consider what Washington, DC* parent Natalie Hopkinson has to say about her child’s educational options:

Competition produces winners and losers; I get that. ... Naturally, I’ve only considered high-performing schools for my children, some of them public, some charter, some parochial, all outside our neighborhood.

…[I]t’s a cynical game. There aren’t enough slots in the best neighborhood and charter schools. So even for those of us lucky ones with cars and school-data spreadsheets, our options are mediocre at best.

Or think about New Orleans.* The city may have more “choice” than anywhere else in the country. Since Hurricane Katrina, the vast majority of public schools in the city are charter. Neighborhood schools are a thing of the past.

As in New York and DC, the quality of schools varies widely. But in addition to concerns with the quality of options, what is more disturbing is that some families get left out almost entirely. As one parent of a special needs student points out, "Some schools call back when you say you have a special education child, some don't.”

Parents of such students can have an extremely difficult time finding one school that will take, and serve, their child. Not much choice in this theoretically choice-rich environment.**

Some might argue that in all three places – NYC, DC and New Orleans – choice policies are relatively new. That officials have not had time to work the kinks out of the system. That the market has not had time to work its magic on school quality. That the situations will improve soon.

For them, I return to Hopkinson. She writes:

The system recently floated a plan … with a proposal for new magnet middle school programs in my neighborhood, none of which would open in time for my son. These proposals … are aimed at some speculative future demographic, while doing nothing for the children already here.” [emphasis added]

Certainly we must improve schools for future generations. The status quo is unacceptable.

But concentrating our efforts on policies and practices that create such distinct winners and losers among children today isn’t right.

The ultimate solution is that every school needs to be a great one. Certainly that is a difficult proposition. If it were easy, it would already be.

But every day we learn more about professional learning experiences that make a difference for students. The role that community and family partners can play in improving academic outcomes. What content students should master to thrive in our economy and democracy.  How to energize a leader. And we have a number of models from across the country that can show us how to turn around a struggling school. We can also look internationally (at Finland, for example) to see what it takes to transform an entire system.

Choice policies that give families mediocre options aren’t the answer. All children will end up at some school, so every school has to be great.

*Both DC and New Orleans are widely acknowledged to offer a great deal of choice. Neither was included in the Brookings index.

**As a result, the Louisiana Department of Education is being sued for discrimination and failure to comply with special education law.

Image by Enoch Lau.