Everybody is hating too much on Geneva City Schools, and it’s a bit unfair. Hear me out.

As a Geneva High graduate and a high school English teacher and assistant principal in NYC public schools for 15-plus years, I care about the reputation of my hometown school because I know what Geneva is: Geneva is all heart, baby. I also know what Geneva is up against. Geneva is not serving a simple, highly advantaged student population. Geneva is serving a diverse, high-needs, multilingual, economically varied community. That work is harder. It just is.

A neighboring district like, for example Canandaigua, may look better on paper, but Geneva is doing incredibly different work with a much more complex student population. The raw performance does not prove Canandaigua, or school districts like it, serves kids better. Period. That is the point families need to understand. Canandaigua is often treated as the gold standard district in the Finger Lakes; however, its community profile is very different from everywhere around it, such as Geneva, Waterloo, Seneca Falls, Newark, and other surrounding districts that serve more concentrated student needs.

So, when people say, “Canandaigua has better scores,” or “I’m sending my kids there,” my response is: “Well, sure if that’s what you want but wait tell me why? Just cause scores are better?” Scores mean very little to anyone in education who knows anything; a district like that, quite frankly, should be better; they are a more advantaged district, but that does not necessarily mean it is a district doing better instructional work or better by kids’ social-emotional wellbeing. No way — not at all.

Take a quick look at the community context: Canandaigua’s median household income is about $83,929 with approximately 6.2% of families below poverty and 7.2% receiving SNAP benefits. Geneva’s median household income is about $69,961, with about 21.8% of families below poverty and 28.9% receiving SNAP benefits. That is not a small difference. That is a story behind the scores, no doubt.

Geneva is doing real work with real complexity. So are districts like Waterloo, Seneca Falls, Newark, and others across the region. These districts should not be dismissed because they do not look like an outlier on a spreadsheet with some easy to manipulate numbers.

And, frankly, Geneva gets criticized in ways that more advantaged districts do not. People are quick to question Geneva’s quality, reputation, safety, rigor, or outcomes, but they rarely ask a more honest question: What would a district like Canandaigua’s numbers look like if it served Geneva’s student population? That is not an attack. That is context.

Canandaigua’s scores are not meaningless. But they are not proof of a better district; not even close. Parents should read carefully, especially when millennial families my age are using school districts to make major decisions about where to live.

Geneva deserves a fairer conversation.

If families want to compare schools, I hope to model better questions you can ask of district leaders and admin. For example, how do you teach kids to read and when? Do you teach cursive? Why (not)? Who is an adult in this building a lot of kids like? Why do you think they like this adult? What is it about this adult that is different or unique than the others? Who does the district serve — give me real numbers of how many special education kids are in my kiddos class and how many multilingual learners are in my kids class? How many students are living in poverty who attend the school? How much academic growth are students making? What supports exist for students who enter below grade level, and how are you ensuring a kid gets caught up and on grade level by the end of the year if they are behind? How do you communicate to parents if kids are behind in grade-level standards? How does the district serve kids who need more?

Answers to those questions matter more than reputation.

Before we write off Geneva, or any Finger Lakes school for that matter, let’s dig deeper. Geneva deserves better than lazy comparisons, and it deserves to be judged honestly.

Most importantly, to me, Geneva kids deserve to hear that their schools, their community, and their future are worth standing up for and engaging with meaningfully.

Calee Prindle is a 2007 graduate of Geneva High School.