Executive Summary
To comply with state and federal requirements, the Michigan Department of Education developed a ranking list for schools that attempts to measure school quality. This “Top-to-Bottom” ranking, however, has been repeatedly criticized by educators for appearing to be correlated with school poverty rates: Schools that serve more lower-income students tend to receive lower scores on the TTB list.
This study examines this issue and finds evidence that there is a statistically meaningful relationship between a school’s poverty rate