Abusive Cornerstone Prep Attempts PR Comeback

The Achievement School District (ASD), which was formed in Tennessee to charterize the state’s poorest schools in the same fashion that the Recovery School District has done to New Orleans, had their point person for the Memphis Corporate Appeal, Jane Roberts, to do a PR piece to help in the recovery of the abusive and scandal-ridden Cornerstone Prep in Memphis. 

Marching to Cornerstone Drum

In 2012, parents complained that children were being abused by the insensitive white corporate missionaries hired to culturally sterilize Shelby County’s poorest children. 

As a response, Cornerstone hired an auditor to determine that no abuse had was present, which he did without ever talking to parents who had complained.  Where was Shelby County Schools?  Or the Achievement School District?  Quiet as church mice.

Jane Roberts’ new propaganda piece for Cornerstone quotes from bogus test score “gains” that the corporate clones have produced this year, which claim that during the first five months of this school year,

across every subject and every grade, the average K-5 youngster in Binghamton learned more, and in a shorter time, than 75 percent of kids in the nation starting at the same place.

Third-graders at Cornerstone mastered 13 months’ of math in five months; ditto for fourth-graders in reading and fifth-graders in science.

Jane Roberts does not ask what tests were administered or who monitored them—she just prints what the ASD hands her. 

Comparing these children’s test scores to those who are equally impoverished is the new strategy to conceal the proficiency chasms that remain between the kids in the leafy suburbs and those in the gritty testing camps of Memphis.

While Jane and the rest of us must remain in the dark on details of these ASD mid year assessments at Cornerstone, there are some numbers that we do know about that that compare Cornerstone to the two other elementary ASD chain gangs in Memphis. 

These (below) are from the State website and reflect the most recent state tests.  Decide for yourself if you think these scores show that Cornerstone is performing higher than 75 percent of other schools of its kind across the nation, To be sure, it is doing no better, or worse, than its impoverished neighbors in Memphis.

Average Growth Index (AGI) = 0 : On average, the students in this school met the Standard for Academic Growth.


Average Growth Index (AGI) > 0 : On average, the students in this school exceeded the Standard for Academic Growth.

Average Growth Index (AGI) < 0 : On average, the students in this school did not meet the Standard for Academic Growth.

Third Grade Reading/LA

School		Average Growth Index	Quintile
			Achv	Predicted Achv	Growth
	Cornerstone Prep - Lester Campus	-1.8	1	1	1
	Corning Achievement Elementary	-0.7	1	1	2
	Frayser Achievement Elementary	-4.9	1	1	1

Third Grade Math

School		Average Growth Index	Quintile
			Achv	Predicted Achv	Growth
	Cornerstone Prep - Lester Campus	-1.2	1	1	2
	Frayser Achievement Elementary	1.0	1	1	4
	Corning Achievement Elementary	0.8	1	1	4

Third Grade Social Studies

	Cornerstone Prep - Lester Campus	-3.2	1	1	1
	Corning Achievement Elementary	-3.9	1	1	1
	Frayser Achievement Elementary	-6.7	1	1	1

Third Grade Science

School		Average Growth Index	Quintile
			Achv	Predicted Achv	Growth
	Cornerstone Prep - Lester Campus	-5.5	1	1	1
	Corning Achievement Elementary	-3.4	1	1	1
	Frayser Achievement Elementary	-7.6	1	1	1