NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Mark Tallman with the Kansas Association of School Boards says that educational outcomes are improving, even if test scores are not.
"If you look at long-term measures, like the percentage of our population that graduates, goes on to post-secondary education and earns more as a result, we've continued to make improvements and, in fact, are at an all-time high. There's a lot of facts out there. I rarely find something that isn't true, but sometimes it isn't part of the whole picture or the whole context."
Researchers believe 70 to 75% of all future jobs will require a credential beyond high school.
"Societal needs have changed from an economy that was not particularly high skilled," Tallman said. "Basic literacy skills, basic math skills, for most kids, a high school diploma was all you needed. What was required for a high school diploma was less than we expect now. We've shifted to a world where most jobs require more than high school, require a higher level of literacy and math and a whole lot more social concerns over things like dealing with mental health and managing technology and managing a lot of issues that weren't there for older generations."
Learning loss connected with COVID-19 is something both public and private schools will be dealing with for years to come.
"Private schools generally perform about the same as public schools who have comparable student demographics," Tallman said. "In other words, if you have fewer kids with high needs, you tend to do better, public or private. Private schools also declined, the five major private school systems in Kansas, Catholic diocese, Lutheran schools, that are accredited, all have seen a decline in performance over the same time as public schools, all of which got worse during COVID."
Most recently, Kansas high school completion reached 91.8 percent, any college 66.8 percent, and four-year degrees or higher 34.5 percent.
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