The school board received evidence of academic dishonesty, specifically from reading and math grades for Thomas High School ninth graders. In order to uphold state-testing standards, they want to replace the math and reading scores for Thomas High School with NaNs while keeping the rest of the data intact. Therefore in the PyCitySchools_Challenge notebook, the suspected math and reading scores were replaced with NaNs and then the school district analysis (from PyCitySchools) was repeated. Click here to access the PyCitySchools_Challenge notebook: PyCitySchools_Challenge
Due to the 9th grade math and reading scores of Thomas High School being disregarded, these scores were replaced with NaNs in student_data as seen in the image below.
When comparing data prior to replacing NaNs (hereon referred to as 'pre') and after replacing NaNs (hereon refrerred to as 'post'), there is no change in columns of 'Total Schools','Total Students' and 'Total Budget'. However, there is a very minor change in '% Passing math', '% Passing reading', and '% Overall passing', as seen from the images below.
Math and reading scores of all 9th graders from Thomas High School were removed and replaced with NaNs. As a results, Thomas High School's passing percentage seemed to drop alot, as seen below:
This school summary was generated with student count remaining the same as before. However, this comaprison is not fair because if the 9th graders scores are not being utilized then the 9th grade students should also be dropped from the student count in order to calculate pass percentage.
Pre: THS was among the top 5 schools based on performance of all grades.
Post: As discussed in #2 above, by removing the scores of 9th graders and still counting 9th grader students in student count, there seems to be a huge impact and THS seemed to have become one of the bottom 5 performers, dropping the overall passing % from 90.95% to 65.07%.
However, when the student count was adjusted to remove the 9th graders (taking only 10th, 11th, and 12th graders into account), THS was still among the top 5 performers with overall passing% @ 90.63%.
Images showing all 3 situations discussed here are attached below.
When student count was unchanged:
When student count was reduced for THS:
4a. Math and reading scores by grade
Math and reading scores for 9th graders in THS were replaced with NaN. There was no other change for any other school or grade. Pre and Post images attached below.
4b. Scores by school spending
THS is in the $630-$644 range spending bin. There is no change in any other bin. Even in this bin the impact is so minor that it is not visible when scores are formatted to the nearest tenths. Pre and Post images attached below.
4c. Scores by school size
THS is medium sized school. The difference in Pre and Post scores is in the hundreths place, which becomes insignificant when formatted to the nearest whole number. Pre and Post images attached below.
4d. Scores by school type
THS is a charter school. The difference in Pre and Post scores is in the tenths place, which becomes insignificant when formatted to the nearest whole number. Pre and Post images attached below.
- Due to suspected dishonesty in Thomas High School, Math and reading scores for 9th graders in THS were replaced with NaN.
- District Summary shows minor changes in '% Passing math', '% Passing reading', and '% Overall passing'
- After removing 9th grade scores AND the student count from the calculation, Thomas High School is still a top performing school with minor difference (tenths place) in average math/reading scores and passing percentages. However, If the 9th graders scores were dropped but students were still counted in the calculation of percentage, then THS would be within bottom 5 schools.
- Difference in scores by school spending, school size and school type is very minor (tenths or hundreths place) and is insignificant due to rounding.