Learning More About Long Island Towns

 


Long Island is a wonderful place to live! It is even better to know more about the towns you have grown up in or around. Learning more through a new perspective! (Etsy LI, NY Map)


Welcome back for the last time everybody! I hope you enjoyed the weekly posts and have been keeping up with the ever-changing content. This week is a little bit different from previous weeks. As you may know, we did a Community Comparison Project, in which we investigated the stark differences between two towns on Long Island. I chose to learn more about the Farmingdale School District and the Herricks School District. However, that's not what today's blog is about! Instead, I have read over one of my classmate's projects and got to gain more insight into the Bethpage School District and the Amityville School District. 

Just by reading the graphs and short explanations in parts one and two of this project, it is abundantly clear that these towns differ in many ways. Right off the bat, class sizes are much smaller in Amityville than in Bethpage, and the overall graduation rate is 97% (Bethpage), compared to a shocking 86% (Amityville). Standardized test scores are also very different. Amityville students are, on average less proficient in both English and Math compared to Bethpage students. The final difference that caught my eye was that of the racial diversity and ethnic populations within each school district. Bethpage is predominantly White while Amityville is mostly populated by the Black and Hispanic communities. Only 5% of the population in Amityville schools are White. Overall, the differences are quite apparent, especially having looked at the charts. After further reflection of my own, I feel that these districts offer two very distinctive educational experiences. With the test scores and graduation rates alone, it can be determined that Bethpage students are given perhaps a more thorough education, while Amityville schools are still developing. 

After reading my peer's reflection within the third part of this assignment, I came to realize that we had a very similar analysis of the data presented. One of the very first things she touched upon was the disparity in racial diversity between the two districts. I was most taken aback by the explicit difference between proficiency scores in English and Math. She highlighted this as well, to enhance the understanding that the districts have contrasts. Overall, I felt like she had a great awareness of the two school districts and it helped to deepen my own understanding of them as well.



References:

Long Island New York. Etsy (2022). https://i.etsystatic.com/1012386 3/r/il/26ab70/2053355178/il_1588x N.2053355178_6384.jpg

Madison Cooper. Community Comparison Project. https://wakelet.com/wake/fI7kQ8Gd5jnds3b8wfOFn 


Comments

  1. Taylor HazeltonDecember 12, 2022 at 6:35 PM

    Hi Kelly, I enjoyed your assessment of Maddie's community comparison project. I grew up a few towns over from Amityville, and my dad attended high school there. It is not a particularly wealthy community, so the first thing that actually shocked me was the average home value. It is also a typical trend for more diverse areas to be lower socio-economically than that of their predominantly white counterparts. It immediately made me think of Amityville harbor, which is considered the "rich" part of town with many large houses. I also know from growing up in that area that it is also very common for people in Amityville harbor to send their children o private schools as opposed to the Amityville school district. I also know the women's lacrosse coach who often reported not being able to get students to practice because they had other life responsibilities such as jobs or babysitting siblings. I assume these factors contribute to the lower success rate and graduation rate in the Amityville school district. I do not have much experience with the Bethpage school district, but I would have loved to have an insiders perspective on how the district. I also am curious to know some more about the ELL programs both schools had to offer. But i appreciate Maddie and your assessments of the two districts.

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  2. Leyla KalmazDecember 14, 2022 at 3:50 PM

    Hi Kelly
    I really appreciate your thorough review of the Bethpage and Amityville school districts. I think the biggest difference we can visualize from these districts is the diversity in Amityville and the lack of diversity in Bethpage. However, diversity means so many things. In this case, we are looking at student ethnicities. But diversity also can mean inclusion and equity. I think it's incredibly important that we understand and learn all about diversity in school districts as we will teach diverse students in the future. Interestingly, you were able to connect your classmate's project with your own project. This just proves that we are learning to become more academically and socially successful in the classrooms for this generation. I really enjoyed working on this project and getting to see and read other people's projects as well. This project allowed us to realize how similar school districts are on Long Island but also how they differ in ways that the staff and faculty of each district establish their own unique strategies. No matter where we end up in a location of teaching, we must do our best to provide the knowledge and information that we have learned from this important project and everything else in this course.

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