An Unscheduled Stop – PSAT Outcome Review Request

 

On Tuesday, January 8, I picked up the day’s edition of the Florida Sentinel-Bulletin in the late afternoon. Page 2 included, “Community Urged to Attend Partnership Meeting.”

I am one of the community members interested in East Tampa. My specific interest relates to what the community is doing for and with black students, especially black male high school students who have strong reading skills and live in zip code 33610.

The large turnout for the meeting met with the approval of Ms. Best, the chair of the East Tampa Community Revitalization Partnership and City Council member and chair of the City Council Community Redevelopment Board, Reverend Thomas Scott. Most of the speakers had comments related to physical improvements in the community and the investment of government dollars to fuel further economic development.

I had a chance to speak as well. My request is that, at the meeting in February, the Partnership invites a member of the School District of Hillsborough County to review the PSAT score results for freshmen and sophomores from zip code 33610. Local and state tax dollars made the opportunity available to these students last October to take the PSAT. Though we live in an age of instant information access, students will not receive their score reports until later this month.

“Diagnostic information generated from the PSAT is used by the district and by schools to make decisions about curriculum revisions, identify the academic strengths and weaknesses of students, determine ways to eliminate the achievement gap, improve readiness for the SAT, and prepare students for postsecondary education. Results from the PSAT generate an Advanced Placement (AP) Potential list of students who are likely to score well on an AP exam.”

Hillsborough County Public Schools (Florida) * Mtg.#20061010_185 * Section E Item# 9.02

This could be the first year that the Partnership signals to the School District that it wants to know how the students are doing in demonstrating the potential for the rigorous academic classes that lead to preparation for college success. Perhaps the School District will be able to share specific information about the PSAT results for students in zip code 33610. Some number of freshmen and sophomores may have combined Reading/Math scores of 97 or better. Though individual student names will not be available for privacy reasons, the data could include the number of students by gender, race and high school meeting this criterion.

I would be happy to discuss with the Partnership leadership how that PSAT data could help them build the indigenious human capital so that they do not have to depend on the responses from outside economic development experts during the next 24 years.

In His Service,

Jason