The article the other day about how El Paso ranks as the safest major city in the United States ended with a comment about quality of life in our city.
Safety, housing, pet friendliness, and our ranking as the best city in Texas to raise a family were discussed.
What we did not talk about however was education. How does public school education in El Paso compare to the other major Texas cities?
I went to www.schooldigger.com. The site provides rankings of cities and school districts nationwide. They base their rankings on scores that students receive on standardized tests.
Surprised
What I found surprised me. The site lists results for 853 cities in Texas. Their results for the eight largest cities in Texas are:
CITY RANKING SCORE
AUSTIN 343 .595
EL PASO 442 .523
ARLINGTON 516 .476
HOUSTON 579 .418
SAN ANTONIO 613 .394
DALLAS 652 .361
FORT WORTH 676 .338
CORPUS CHRISTI 682 .333
The best ranking would be one and the best score would be .999.
While many of us feel that our children are not receiving as good an education as we did in the old days, El Paso ranks second only to Austin when looking at the major Texas cities.
Yet our local paper continues to flog the school districts.
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
Education is an easy target for the press, because, by and large, educators do not fight back.
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“Education” has not been the target of the local press. It is the corrupt administrators and board members who have been the target. Next, you’ll be blaming the media for low test scores. And let’s not paint “educators” as pacifists, especially those who abuse the public trust (and in some cases students) and violate the rights of students through manipulation and dishonest practices.
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Yes, Victor. Educators have much better things to do. Besides, it is not the teachers that are the problem in El Paso as everyone should know by now.
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Am l the only one who wonders why if we have all of this educatin’ going on, then why do we continue to have high illiterate rates and low college grad rates?
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Raging Chihuahua, what a dumb question. That is like asking “If cars are so safe, why do people die in car wrecks?” “If capitalism is so great, why do businesses collapse and go bankrupt?”
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Allow me to use your own analogies to demonstrate what a buffoon you truly are. lf you build modern-day, high tech cars, they’re more likely to be safer than cars that were built a generation ago. And the more capitalistic a nation is, (less litigation, less regulations) the better the chance that a business will not go bankrupt. It’s kind of like when cities and states that have higher quality public schools, that those kiddies are more likely to graduate from college. You picked the wrong person to be stupid with. Have a splendid weekend.
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RC,
You prove my point exactly. No matter how many safety features you have, people still die in car wrecks. No matter how good you think capitalism is, businesses still go broke. No matter how much “educatin’ (as you so eloquently put it) you have, kids will still drop out or fail, or be illiterate.
The fact is, more kids are graduating than ever before, more people are going to college than ever before (have you seen the enrollment figures for UTEP and EPCC for instance?).
If you want to get in a flame war, go somewhere else. Brutus doesn’t like that kind of behavior. If you want to discuss the issues then feel free.
Have a nice weekend.
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Yes I agree about the flame war.
Please make your comments relate to the issues and not to individuals.
I have only had to edit one or two comments in the past and hope to avoid the need to do it in the future.
Thank you all for your involvement.
Brutus
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Dear Reality,
If education is not the target of the local press, then please answer the question Brutus posed: Why isn’ the fact that El Paso schools are ranked very highly ever reported?
Have you seen the report that Brutus cites in any local press?
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Brut, l completely agree with your sentiments. Even though l didn’t start this “flame war” by calling my question stupid. l’m going to once again be the grown-up in the room and simply ignore what that delusional idi…..err, l mean what that person typed. Being mature doesn’t feel all that bad after all!
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