Mainstream media loves to disparage Arizona’s kindergarten through 12th grade education system. State rankings are often the source of this disparagement, invariably ranking Arizona 47th, 48th, or 49th.
Over the past year, U.S. News and World Reportranked New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Connecticut as the top education states in the nation, first through third, respectively. Next, WalletHubranked these same three states as the top three states in the nation. Then, along comes an organization called Scholaroo also ranking Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Connecticut as the top three K-12 education states in the nation.
They all agree on the three states with the top rankings, but where do they rank Arizona? They rank Arizona respectively, 47th, 48th, and 50th. That would seem pretty definitive.
But do these three states really have better schools than Arizona? Both U.S. News and WalletHub seem to think so . But is their ranking based on science? Are they correct? Are they completely out of whack? Let’s check their analysis.
The U.S. Department of Education performs the National Assessment of Educational Progress, spending over $100 million per year to measure the performance of the U.S. K-12 system. The National Assessment is based on a random sample of over 3,000 students in each state. This sample is pulled once every two years.
U.S. News, WalletHub, and Scholaroo each make a fundamental error in the way they compare states. Because Connecticut is 75% White and 42% college educated, they are comparing the test results of a White student with college educated parents with a minority student from Arizona with immigrant parents. That’s not science. That’s a joke.
We can use the National Assessment data to make an apples-to-apples comparison.
Here are is the data for 8th grade math scores of Blacks and Hispanics for Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Arizona:
8th Grade Math Scores
Arizona
Massachusetts
Connecticut
New Jersey
Blacks
267
267
256
266
Hispanics
269
269
263
269
Arizona 8th grade math scores for Blacks and Hispanics (42% of our K-12 student population) are equal to or greater than all these states considered top three states by WalletHub and U.S. News.
In other words, if test scores are your measure, Arizona’s schools are among the very best in the country in educating Blacks and Hispanics.
These are media companies. It’s not unusual to find them to be short on scientific standing. When you dig in to find out why the media companies get it so wrong, you find that the source of their error is that they are comparing a low-income Hispanic Arizona student with a high-income east coast White student and pretending that you can make a conclusion from that comparison about the quality of schools. No reputable researcher believes that. Each state has a different percentage of Hispanic, Black, and White students.
We can expand this 8th grade math comparison to all 50 states. When we do, we find that Arizona Blacks rank 3rd, only a point away from first. Only two other states have 8th grade test scores for Blacks higher than Arizona. Arizona Asians rank 5th, Arizona Hispanics rank 14th, and Arizona Whites rank 6th.
Race is only one factor you can adjust for. Several years ago, the Urban Institute did a more comprehensive regression analysis which also took into account parent’s education and family income as well as race. In that ranking, Arizona ranked 13th in the nation. Even that analysis is suspect. Arizona ranks 4th in the nation in the percentage of foreign-born Hispanics. The Urban Institute’s analysis did not separate foreign-born and native-born Hispanics and as a result, ranked Arizona lower than it might otherwise have been.
We know that Arizona schools, strengthened by the nation’s most competitive school environment for 30 years, rank much higher than the mainstream media would let us know. And perhaps higher than the leftist think-tanks want to admit.
For years now, we’ve heard the same old talking points from the left when it comes to our state’s schools. It always goes a little something like this:
Education is underfunded in Arizona…
Teachers aren’t paid enough…
We need to raise taxes to pay our teachers more…
Do these lines sound familiar? They should. Anytime a new proposition is rolled out to voters, teachers’ unions and other liberals push this same narrative. We heard it when they campaigned for Prop 208 a couple years ago. And despite the fact that the Arizona Supreme Court struck down Prop 208 because Arizona is already funding schools at historic levels, we continue to hear it from Red4Ed and others as they target the state’s $1.8 billion tax cuts.
That’s what makes the latest news out of Mesa Public Schools (MPS) even more outrageous.
House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding (D-Laveen) said that those elected officials celebrating the elimination of the income tax increase weren’t leaders in any sense of the word. The Maricopa County Superior Court ruled on Friday that the increased income tax, Prop 208, was unconstitutional because it exceeded the allowed spending limit for what the tax dollars would be purposed for: education.
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: Standing on the table beating your chest because you were successful taking money from our classrooms & teachers (while overturning the will of voters) isn't leadership, it's a lack thereof! #Prop208
The remark came after Governor Doug Ducey tweeted that the court ruling was a “win for Arizona taxpayers.” Ducey did note that he anticipated the ruling would be appealed but expressed confidence that the Arizona Supreme Court would also find Prop 208 to be unconstitutional.
This ruling is a win for Arizona taxpayers. It’s another step in undoing the damage of Prop 208 and making sure we continue to benefit from having the lowest flat income tax rate in the nation. 1/
Bolding issued similar sentiments in 2018, vowing that Ducey’s support for the demise of a similar tax hike would cost him his election that year. Ducey won comfortably, earning 56 percent of the vote over the Democratic candidate, David Garcia, who earned under 42 percent of the vote.
Mark my words. Today is the day @dougducey loss the election for Governor of Arizona. Removing @investinedaz from the ballot and going against the will of the people and the #REDforED movement will have consequences. Our kids & communities shouldn't have to beg for resources.
If you have been listening to the left and their friends in the media over the last several years, you might be under the impression that conservatives in the legislature have chronically underfunded K-12 education. But this couldn’t be further from the truth, and the truly historic levels of education funding actually threatens their soak the rich tax hike (Prop 208).
The reason we know K-12 is funded at historic levels is because there is a constitutional expenditure limit. Next year, we’re on track to blast above it. By billions.
Their pivot has been to attack the expenditure limit, as opposed to acknowledging how much the state is spending. But taxpayers should be thankful for this constitutional protection. It isn’t outdated, and it isn’t holding our schools back.
Senate candidate Blake Masters believes that the modern school system is broken, characterized by “twin tower issues,” he told AZ Free News: teaching “junk” instead of what they need to know. Masters delivered that message in his latest campaign video, similar to his last: a monologue on conservative values delivered in a field, hearkening back to the simplicity of Thomas Jefferson’s yeoman farmer.
“Here’s a harsh truth for you. Our schools are making our kids dumber. The 1619 history curriculum teaches kids that America is somehow fundamentally evil, or racist. Critical Race Theory teaches kids to identify with each other in racial terms. You’re either a victim, or an oppressor based on the color of your skin. And even if you wipe away all this left-wing toxic ideology from our schools – the schools are still failing to teach kids the basics. We’re graduating kids that can’t even read or write. I’m Blake Masters. I’m running for the U.S. Senate in Arizona. And I approve this message because we’ve got to fund students, not systems. We’ve gotta make sure that young people are learning to think for themselves.”
“We’re going to stop woke teachers and schools from turning our kids into losers,” tweeted Masters.
We’re going to stop woke teachers and schools from turning our kids into losers. pic.twitter.com/dkWMCG7NnR
In an interview with AZ Free News, Masters explained that his video was a sort of thought experiment to inspire a critical assessment of our modern school system – every type from public to private schools. He remarked that the focus on pushing social justice agendas at the expense of “teaching real history and cultivating actual skills and talents” was both a cause and effect of deep-rooted issues in the school system.
“I think that’s both a driver of the poor performance but also somehow a symptom of it,” said Masters.
Masters believes the problematic school system is why Republican Governor-Elect Glenn Youngkin secured victory in a presumptively deep-blue state.
“I think we just saw the Youngkin win in Virginia had a lot to do with the school issue and parents frustration and that one gaffe [by Democratic candidate Terry McCauliffe], but it wasn’t a gaffe it was really what he thought: that parents shouldn’t have a say [in their children’s education,” assessed Masters.
Just over a month before Election Day, McCauliffe declared that parents ought to have no power when it comes to their children’s curriculum.
Masters has firsthand experience of political indoctrination in the school system, all the way back in 1994. He told AZ Free News that his teacher had his second-grade class write letters to the editor of the local paper, The Arizona Daily Star, to object to a housing development that razed desert land next to the school.
“I remember in second grade my dad got really mad because [… the school] had us write letters to the editors. There’s a letter that’s printed from me saying it’s so unfair that the developments would do this and that to the lizards and cacti,” recalled Masters. “That was the beginning of some kind of left-wing environmentalist indoctrination. [Other students said that] people shouldn’t even live in houses, they should live in mud huts. The teachers were pointing us in a certain direction. My dad wrote a very scathing response and it was published [as well].”
AZ Free News found the young Masters’ letter to the editor: in 1994, letters from Canyon View Elementary School second-graders were published in a full-page spread titled “Damaging the Desert” in The Arizona Daily Star. The students all echoed similar messages about how “the animals must find new homes,” and condemned both the developers and homeowners for their greed and “killing Mother Nature.”
“Man is killing Mother Nature just for money,” wrote one second-grader, Brian Benhke.
It appeared that one or more teachers took the students into the desert after it had been razed by developers, where they reportedly found blood-covered rocks and animals’ remains. It is unclear if that was the intent of the educators.
Reproduced below is the letter from a young Blake Masters:
“I am concerned because next to our school they are destroying the environment to build new houses. I think they should make sure all the houses in Tucson are taken up before constructing new ones. Why do the workers listen to the boss? If the boss told them to jump off a cliff, would they do it? For the money, sure, just for the money, they’re destroying other animals’ habitats when they don’t have to. Pretty soon we won’t have enough oxygen to live on. In a few years the Sonoran Desert could be ruined. We should make a Desert Belt like the Green Belt in Boulder, Colo[rado]. Maybe if more people lived together, we would not need to build so many houses. If someone doesn’t do something, the Earth will be gone, and we have only one. Maybe people who have more money should not build a huge house. When workers finally realize what they have done, they will say they’re innocent.” (emphasis added)
A month later, Masters’ father issued a lengthy response criticizing the public school system for prioritizing a social justice agenda over educating the second-graders about American freedoms such as private property. The senior Masters pointed out that the vacant land was the private property of the developer, anyway, and that the children who grieved over losing their playground were actually trespassers on that private property. Masters also pointed out that the developed land was for multi-family housing, His remarks strike a familiar tone with parents’ current grievances with the school system.
“These letters these children authored demonstrates that they are being taught (by intent or default) the antithesis of economic freedom. Inherent in our free enterprise system is the vital concept of private property. Without economic freedom and its private property derivative, all other freedoms are meaningless. Along with other constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms, grade school children can understand the critically important concept of private property. After all, what child by the age of 2 has not mastered the usage of the word ‘mine?’ If the children had been exposed to the importance of private property rights, wouldn’t one expect that at least one of the letters would mention that vacant land was the developer’s private property? Had anyone pointed out to the children that when they played on this vacant land, they were in fact trespassing on the private property of another? My surprise at what they are not being taught is surpassed only by what they are being taught. That they are not being taught the basic American values of the individual over the state, economic freedom, and private property is bad enough. What’s even worse is that these letters reveal that our children are being taught that mankind is subservient to plants and animals. Even more alarming is that they are being taught so with scare tactics.”
After that, Masters attended public school until the fifth grade before switching to a private school from sixth grade through his senior year of high school. He recalled learning that Christoper Columbus was a “murderer” in the fourth grade. It wasn’t all bad, however – Masters said he had some unadulterated history education, such as the life and legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr.
“I think that stuff has gotten way way worse since I was a kid,” remarked Masters. “I remember learning about MLK and why that was important. I remember that people used to treat people badly based on the color of their skin. I remember learning about that. Now that seems so old-fashioned. That’s just not what kids learn in K-2 anymore. It’s really shifted since I was a kid.”
Both of letters from the senior and junior Masters are available here.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
