While the Connecticut State Department of Education (CSDE) issued a press release this past week announcing the availability of last school year academic data, Hartford Public Schools (HPS) “leadership” remained silent on the data, issuing no puff-piece statement to local media, and Superintendent Torres-Rodriguez’s weekly “Superintendent Update” focused instead on the start of the new school year, as if to say, “well, there’s always next year.”

CSDE academic data for the 2023-24 school year shows that HPS’ average SAT scores in math and ELA declined for the third consecutive year.  After three straight years of decline, HPS’ average ELA SAT score has now declined 9% from where it was in 2018-19, while the average math SAT score has declined 8% over the past 4 years.

Granted, in 2018-19 things were not very rosy in this garden either.  The average HPS SAT score in ELA has gone from a 453 in 2018-19 to a 413 today, while in math it has gone from a 436 to a 402.  Hartford’s combined score of 815 falls far short of the 1050 which the College Board, the folks who provide districts with services to prepare students for the SAT, states is the average SAT score.

Hartford is one of 19 districts throughout the state that has posted SAT ELA and math declines in each of the past three years, however, the state as a whole also joins these districts in failing to prepare students for college as overall statewide average SAT scores have seen three consecutive years of decline.  Of the 19 Connecticut school districts showing three straight years of decline, HPS’ 2024 combined 815 score is higher than only the scores of Bridgeport and New London.

So, you should be asking yourself, where are the positive results of the billions of dollars the federal government gave to school districts around the nation four years ago (HPS received $155 million) to prevent learning loss due to the COVID pandemic.  In the context of learning and assessing that learning via the SAT, nineteen districts in Connecticut are still losing ground each and every year!

HPS paid nearly a quarter of a million dollars to the College Board for SAT prep and testing from 2020 to 2022 (2020: $51k, 2021: $96k, 2022: 95k).  In January 2024, the superintendent awarded a $71,000 contract to The Princeton Review, a contract she stated will “improve student outcomes on the assessments (PSAT/SAT).”  This contract was for the students at the magnet school Sports and Medial Sciences Academy (SMSA) only.  Too bad it wasn’t available for the public high schools.  SMSA’s ELA SAT score increased by 13 points in 2024 while their math score increased by 22 points (despite their combined score of 893 still trailing the College Board average of 1050).

If district “leadership” had come out this week and mentioned the release of fresh academic data, I’m sure it would have been something along the lines of what Superintendent Torres-Rodriguez stated about SAT testing in October of 2023 when she took to her weekly newsletter to thank “…families, teachers, staff members, and school counselors for their consistent support of our students in this crucial step toward being prepared for post-secondary success.”

I’ve heard that the band kept playing while the Titanic was sinking.