Great Schools and Education Cities, a network of 31 city-based organizations in 24 cities whose goal is to increase the number of great public schools, joined together to launch The Education Equality Index , EEI.  EEI is the first national comparative measure of the achievement gap between children growing up in low-income households and their more advantaged peers.  The data collected spans 42 states, 15,000 cities, 78,000 schools, and 43,000,000 children.  It is the largest data set of its kind.   The EEI used this data to select the top 10 schools in major cities across the nation that evidence the ability to close or eliminate academic achievement gaps among children from varied backgrounds and socio-economic circumstances.  Presidio was selected as one of the 10 schools from Tucson, Arizona for our ability to provide equal opportunity to all of the children we serve.

According to the Education Equality Index, EEI, Arizona ranks third in the country with the number of schools that are closing the achievement gap for all children.  Presidio is extremely proud of the fact that with so many excellent schools in Tucson, we were ranked in the top ten for Tucson.  According to Carrie McPherson Douglass from Education Cities, the EEI index was used to name up to 10 schools, listed in alphabetical order, to be recognized for closing the gap in each city. According to Ms. Douglas, Great Schools and Education Cities are not releasing individual school scores or classroom detail at this time because they didn’t want the focus to be on ranking schools but rather on drawing attention to the top schools in each city that are closing the achievement gap so everyone can learn from these schools in order to help more students have access to gap-closing schools.

For more information on Education Cities, the Education Equality Index, and the results of the study please go to www.educationequalityindex.org and www.education-cities.org