A fence outlines the boundaries of Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, dividing the civilian part of the city from the section cordoned off for military operations. Similar barriers exist at Lackland and Randolph Air Force Bases, and on Wednesday, a new dividing line emerged.
Of the 15 school districts in Bexar County, only the three military school districts received top marks from the state in the Texas Education Agency’s accountability system. Fort Sam Houston, Lackland, and Randolph Field ISDs were all graded an A, which the TEA says indicates “exemplary performance.” The majority of other districts in the county received a C or D.
Lackland Superintendent Burnie Roper credits high expectations set by the district and parents for his students’ strong performance.
“Because they move around so much, [military families] are exposed to all types of educational systems – some good, some bad,” Roper said. “They are really picky about where their kids go to school because of them having to pick up and move every three or four years… High expectations are definitely one of the things that we have at Lackland and I’m sure at the other military districts.”
Roper also credits strong engagement with families, who, in large part, live and work in close proximity to the schools on base. He described his base as a “small community.”
Many families stay at military bases for just a few years before moving to the next assignment, resulting in highly mobile student populations. The district and teachers place special emphasis on creating a familial culture to welcome new arrivals, Roper said.
Julian Treviño, a former school board president in San Antonio ISD and current educational consultant, points to the culture as a reason for military school districts’ success in accountability ratings.
“People live on post, or on base, or in close proximity… and they know one another. The commander’s kids go to school there, the colonel’s kids go to school there, the major’s kids go to school there, your boss’ kids go to school there,” Treviño said. “The culture and community has a lot to do with it.”
In addition, he said, military careers foster a dependence on studying and a strong work ethic, and when children see this dedication to career, the diligence becomes contagious.
But there are other factors at play outside the classroom that can impact a student’s performance, Treviño added – poverty being one of them. Military school districts serve populations with lower levels of poverty, which some have said make it easier for the districts to achieve at high levels.
“In the non-military school systems, you have varying percentages of low socioeconomic children. In the military districts, you don’t have significant amounts,” Treviño said. “It is the opposite, so that is a significant difference to me.”
SAISD Superintendent Pedro Martinez has repeatedly emphasized that poverty plays a role in student achievement.
“Children that live in poverty come in below grade level, and that is consistent everywhere,” Martinez said at a Wednesday afternoon briefing on the accountability ratings. “They need extra support.”
The district that scored the highest on the state’s accountability system, Randolph Field ISD, has the highest median income of the county’s school districts at just under $90,000, per 2016 American Community Survey data. In comparison, the district that scored the lowest, Edgewood ISD, had the lowest median income at just above $28,000.
But many educators agree that median income isn’t the only indicator of poverty. SAISD Chief Innovation Officer Mohammed Choudhury uses a number of factors to define poverty in his inner-city district: median income, single-parent homes, family home ownership, and educational attainment.
When looking at family composition, military school districts have higher rates of two-parent households than any of their peers. In Fort Sam Houston ISD, for example, 83.8 percent of families are comprised of married-couple families, compared to San Antonio ISD’s 53.2 percent. Lackland and Randolph Field ISDs’ rates were both above 85 percent. None of the San Antonio districts that scored a C or lower cracked 75 percent.
Educational attainment paints a similar picture. In all local military school districts, close to 100 percent of those living on base have a high school degree or higher. Save for Judson ISD, all districts that scored a C or lower show less than 71 percent of the area population earning a high school degree or higher.
“Parents really care… and the education of their children is extremely important because a lot of them obviously have some level of education – whether that education is through the military or through civilian schools,” Roper said of his district families. “Our parents — not that other parents don’t — know for sure the importance of getting a good education. I believe that is instilled in their kids, it is kind of a requirement.”
And then, of course, there is the most widely used indicator of poverty – the percentage of children who qualify for free and reduced lunches based on federal standards.
In military districts, this figure is low. Randolph Field is considered 8 percent economically disadvantaged, Lackland 27 percent, and Fort Sam Houston 30 percent. Throughout the rest of San Antonio, numbers are higher. San Antonio ISD qualifies at 91 percent, South San and Harlandale ISDs at 87 percent, Northside ISD at 48 percent, and North East ISD at 47 percent.
Some educators have been critical of the TEA’s accountability system for penalizing schools with higher levels of poverty. While all schools and districts have the ability to receive an A – Commissioner Mike Morath ensured this was feasible – some say it is harder for poor districts to achieve at high levels.
One category in the grading scheme seeks to take this into account. Morath built in the relative performance category, that measures the progress students are making relative to their peers at similar schools or districts.
“What I like about this system, though, is that it recognizes that children are starting at different levels. And it recognizes that I’m compared to a similar district,” Martinez said of SAISD.
Peer districts are determined by the level of economically disadvantaged students. The TEA applies a curve to this system that benefits districts with higher populations of economically disadvantaged students.
Whereas Lackland, Fort Sam, and Randolph Field ISDs scored As overall, each district scored lower in relative performance, with Lackland and Randolph Field scoring a D when compared to peer districts with similar poverty levels. Fort Sam Houston ISD scored a C.
Roper said he is still trying to make sense of this area of the grading system.
“When you are dealing with kids, [it] doesn’t mean that because the kids are economically disadvantaged, that they are not going to perform well,” Roper said. “[Districts] may have the same percentage of economically disadvantaged students and one may perform high, and one may perform low. What are all those factors in between that contribute to them being high or those being low? I think it is complicated.”
A number of military families reside off post, with their children attending schools in San Antonio or San Antonio area school districts. It would be interesting to know how those students fared in comparison to both their on-post and off-post peers.
Yes, that would be an interesting thing to look into
Thanks for the timely article. I was also curious about the high ranking of the military school districts so I asked an ex military social worker about her thoughts. Three factors that were mentioned were small district size, significantly higher teacher pay, and relatively fewer discipline issues due to the fact that student misbehavior had the potential to directly impact the parent’s military career.
That is great input.
Teacher pay is not “significantly” higher than other area San Antonio districts
As a former military brat I can second the writer’s last point; expectations for behavior and general conduct were well understood.
As someone who has had children attend some of the best DoD schools as well as one of the most economically disadvantaged schools in SAISD, it really irks me when people say or infer our teachers, parents, the community have low expectations for our students in SAISD. Who exactly has low expectations? I don’t. None of the parents I’ve met do. None of my kids’ teachers at Lanier do. Is it the district?
Yes, my kids lived in a military culture where everyone is expected to succeed, but they were also immersed in a culture that provided significant support. Even with great mobility, the support system is always there. We have “sponsors” at new duty stations and “Welcome Aboard” programs that literally walk you through all the services available to you. Even the lowest paid military member never has to worry about housing, healthcare, food security, and support services for kids with special needs. And the schools are funded appropriately. That makes a WORLD of difference.
Compare being a part of that system to being in a poverty stricken family that has to worry housing, healthcare, food insecurity or whether or not your school has special needs teachers? When there is great mobility the kids don’t get a “welcome” anywhere near what military children get. I never worried about not having teachers on the first day of school. We just finished up the first week of school and my son has yet to have a teacher assigned for his Pre-AP Pre-Calculus class. He’s had a substitute. That NEVER happened at a DoD school.
Our military families deserve every single thing they get. But ALL children deserve all the support and resources necessary to succeed.
This article points out what has been obvious for decades. Everyone knows poverty and environment affect educational outcomes. The question is, when will we do something that does more than treat the symptoms of poverty and truly work to get to the root causes to eliminate it?
Literally, our success as a community depends on it.
Queta, you say some amazing things in this which are worth developing further. They really jibe with some things I’ve seen recently in the literature as I’ve tried to dig into this too, although the bigger piece is how you are comparing the two which is FAB. There is so much more to say on this subject, about the barriers that families can face in providing support to their kids when they are working too many jobs, trying to get across town with very limited public transportation, etc., and the impact that ultimately has on who can help with schoolwork, etc. So many interesting ways to take this. But you’re right, primarily it has to CHANGE — even just based on what we understand about it today — let alone what additional nuance we could understand it later with. Kudos to you.
Kudos, Emily, for doing this story. I really appreciate it. In a city where education is and should be a real concern, it’s important to dig into what are the outliers doing right. So much more to learn on this but THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart for jumping and doing this. It’s important!
I’ve taught in poor, rich and middle class schools. Regardless of income level, I’ve noticed one thing in common about almost all successful students and that is parental support (I’ll use this term even though the support can be from any adult outside of the school environment who can constantly influence/push a child in their academic pursuits).
Even at a rich school, there are kids failing and you’ll notice most have very little parental support. Vice versa, there are students who perform very well at poor schools. Most have good parental support.
At a poor school the problem of parental support is more prevalent because many parents are doing all they can to financially support their family including all adults in the household working 2 or more jobs. So even parents who really want to get involved might not be able to do so because making sure their family is feed, clothed and not homeless is the more pressing need. Even so, there are some older students in this situation with no parental support who intrinsically want to succeed in school but find it difficult to do. Their time outside of school is filled up caring for younger siblings while parents work or even taking on a job themselves to help the family out.
Few students in military schools face these type of financial hardships and many references to that were made in this article. In my experience, military parents (whether their kids go to school on base or in a traditional school) are more involved in their child’s education and their children get more support from home than the average student. That would logically lead anyone to think that a school with nothing but military parents should perform better.
Maybe you should ask the Lackland ISD why he is so worried about the charter school being built. He stated ” it gives the parents a choice” at the recent convocation.
As a military junior, I attended both public schools in the community when there were no schools on base and schools on base when there were none in the local community. I believe that a major factor in the “success” of schools and students in military school districts is the lack of distraction for both students and teachers due to discipline problems. In schools with predominantly military student bodies, discipline problems are virtually nonexistent because of a culture of discipline in the home. As anyone who has spent time teaching in public schools in the last 50 years can attest, discipline is perhaps the greatest single deterrent to good teaching and learning.
Having served overseas for 8 years with a child in, and then who graduated from, the Dept of Def. Dep School system I always thought the kids were strongly advantaged by at least one if not both parents having excellent employment (DoD mil or civilian) i.e., little/no poverty.
This article seems to support that feeling/observation/experience from an earlier part of my life.
As the accountability system changes and results come out, we must recall that data never gives us answers, but only gives us questions upon which to ponder. Instead of just focusing on poverty, which I understand is the premise of much of the article, the State of Texas should also review the number of teachers that are certified as Generalists as opposed to content certified. Generalists are usually asked to teach content that is not their specialty, or favorite, but happens to be the area of greatest need such as science or mathematics. These areas are critical to student learning.
It would be good if student absences were also included in the data. Not all absences are consequences of poverty. Absences play a huge role in student learning, and I’m referring to teacher absences not only student’s. Students cannot learn if they are not present and the same holds true if teachers are absent. Some adults, and students, are absent if they visit the dentist for a cleaning. Well, most of the time, that doesn’t take all day. The culture, as Dr. Trevino mentions, must be changed.
The comments that deal solely with poverty as the main reason for lack of student performance should be further looked into since school districts in the Rio Grand Valley (Edinburg, Harlingen, and Hidalgo), which have some areas with greater poverty than those in large urban districts, (not to mention a high ESL (English As A Second Language) Learners), and are still outperforming schools or compare well to affluent school districts elsewhere. These districts have National Merit Scholars consistently as well as Gates Scholars.
The greatest thing that needs to change is the mindset of the pervasive “Poor “Mijito” Syndrome.” Why? Because in America you cannot be what you WANT to be. That is a lie! You can only be what you WORK to be.” If parents understood this a little better, those that do not support their kids, would perhaps do more. That also includes being a great teacher.
Thank you again, Ms Donaldson, for an informative article.
Having had two careers: One as an educator and the other as a military member, I believe I have some qualifications to offer an opinion on this topic. BLUF (bottom line up front): I wish explainers would offer evidence for their expositions.
According to the article, the Lackland superintendent credited “high expectations set by the district and parents for his students’ strong performance.” Is there authoritative evidence for this explanation? He also credited “strong engagement with families” stating “[T]he district and teachers place special emphasis on creating a familial culture.”
Julian Trevino, a current educational consultant explained that “military careers foster a dependence on studying and a strong work ethic, and when children see this dedication to career, the diligence become contagious.” As a consultant, he should know that assertions require the strength of empirical evidence to support them.
Then the explanations for military schools’ top marks from the TEA took a familiar course: (Lack of) poverty. The article stated “[M]ilitary school districts serve populations with lower levels of poverty, which some have said make it easier for the districts to achieve at high levels.” This may indeed be true. But how do we know this theory applies in these cases?
Unfortunately, the article conflated poverty with family composition: Plainly, while as a variable it may indeed correlate with student academic performance, a single-parent home is not a measure of poverty.
Once again regarding poverty, the article states “[S]ome educators have been critical of the TEA’s accountability system for penalizing schools with higher levels of poverty.” The evidence indicates the TEA’s relative performance category controls for poverty by measuring student progress relative to peers at similar schools or districts. Therefore, the poverty explanation as evidence has no weight.
The Lackland superintendent said he is still trying to make sense of the relative grading system stating “[W]hat are all those factors . . . that contribute to . . . high or . . . low? I think it is complicated.” I agree. It is complicated. And that is why we need evidence.
If I may paraphrase from the book Research in Education: Evidence-based Inquiry, theories have implications for practice. Theories provide ideas about what the implications would be when applied to educational settings. Existing educational theories can be tested, revised, or clarified. Accordingly, as presented, the explanations for military schools’ top marks are only theories. Give your theories weight by citing authoritative evidence or by conducting replications to confirm (or refute) them. The bottom line: Theories have implications for practice; offer evidence for your expositions.
Thank you, Ms Donaldson, for an informative article.