【美国中学生】弯曲好学校中的异数：Fremont Mission San Jose High

俺对东湾不熟悉，请筒子们科普一下哈。

MSJ 是个好高中，这是没有问题的。问题是怎么在那周围一片烂学校中突然出来这么一个超好的学校？想其他好学校，都有一个好“学区”在周围方圆几迈的地盘上来支持，如Cupertino, Palo Alto, Saratoga 等等。或像旧金山的 Lowell High, 虽是公立高中，却是全市人民都可以凭考分进去的。唯有MSJ High,因为Fremont 以前是蓝领居住地区，周围的学校烂得很，近几年因房价便宜（相对弯曲其他地方），很多亚裔搬入，学校有很大改善。但是MSJ High 早在十年以前就是好学校了。

其中的奥妙是什么呢？

[laoyangdelp]

回复米汤的评论:excellent reasoning. I'm convinced :-) Are you in education? ;-)

[米汤]

One reason I can think of, some top kids in other districts attend private high school. Alameda county is not known for top independent private schools. So Mission San Jose retains a few more percentage of top students who might have gone to a private high school if they were in south bay (especially Los Altos where the elementary and middle schools are top API rated).

Another observation on API score: Gunn and PA high both have slightly lower score vs Mission San Jose (899, 883 vs 927). However, the larger white subgroup of these two schools actually have higher API score than that of Mission San Jose (909, 894 vs 867). This may tell us that Gunn/PA high schools are more balanced; there are fewer under performing kids in Gunn/PA schools than in Mission San Jose.

I think the similar school ranking is sufficient to differential schools; +- 20 points in API score doesn't really make much difference. Regardless of the API score, what matters is whether a school is a fit for a child. That is why some top district kids still attend private schools.

[laoyangdelp]

回复米汤的评论:
Thanks for the analysis. I heard MSJ was good even before massive Asians moved in. I was wondering about why was it good then.

[米汤]

Since the API score for the white subgroup is about the same (867 vs 870), having 1.5 times more Asian (78% vs 52%) contributed to about 15 API core point difference (927 vs 903). So actually I would say Saratoga High is of a better mix statistically.

[米汤]

The Asian subgroup API score of 2007 is about the same between Mission San Jose High (949) and Saratoga High (943). However, its ratio of subgroup population is much higher (78% vs 52%). Thus Mission San Jose gets higher overall API (927 vs 903). It is hard to say whether the higher ranking school is significantly better.