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C4| Saturday/Sunday, September 7 - 8, 2019 ** THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.**

FROM TOP: STEVE REMICH FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL; CELESTE SLOMAN FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

WILCZEK’SUNIVERSE

FRANK WILCZEK

Big Data

Doesn’t

Interpret Itself

TOMASZ WALENTA

BIG DATA and machine

learning are powering

new approaches to

many scientific ques-

tions. But the history

of astronomy offers an

interesting perspective on how data

informs science—and perhaps a cau-

tionary tale.

Early Babylonian astronomers took

what today we’d call a pure “big

data” or “pattern recognition” ap-

proach. They accumulated observa-

tions of solar, lunar and planetary

motion and eclipses for many centu-

ries and identified various cycles that

had repeated many times. Simply by

assuming that those cycles would

continue, they were able to give good

advice for planting, irrigation and

harvest times, to cast credible horo-

scopes and to predict in advance

when lunar eclipses would occur.

The ancient Greek astronomers

used two distinct methods to under-

stand the same data set. The first

was to make geometric models that

treated the sun, moon, planets and

stars as mathematical abstractions—

shiny points carried upon uniformly

rotating celestial spheres.

At first, the Greeks’ predictions

were no better than those of the Bab-

ylonians—in fact, they were signifi-

cantly worse. But they patched things

up by postulating additional move-

ments of the spheres, called epicy-

cles. These models, which were per-

fected by the 2nd-century astronomer

Ptolemy, seem ugly in retrospect, but

they did package the astronomical

data in a relatively compact form,

and they gave useful practical results.

The second method used by Greek

astronomers was to consider astro-

nomical bodies as real objects with

physical properties. Perhaps the high

point of this effort was the brilliant

determination by Aristarchus, in the

3rd century B.C., of the ratio of the

distances from the Earth to the sun

and the moon. Assuming that the

moon shines by reflected sunlight,

and measuring the angle between the

sun and the half-moon when both are

visible in the sky, he calculated the

ratio using simple trigonometry.

Yet a proper synthesis of the

mathematical and physical ap-

proaches to astronomy wasn’t

achieved for many centuries. That’s

because the available “big data”—the

easily observable patterns of the sun,

moon and stars—are cryptic, superfi-

cial signs of the deep structure be-

neath.

Copernicus, in the 16th century,

discovered that he could get more

beautiful versions of Ptolemy-style

models if he put the sun, rather than

the Earth, at the center of the celes-

tial spheres. Ptolemy’s work typically

gets rough treatment in the history

of science, but it was absolutely es-

sential to Copernicus’s breakthrough

in offering a physical explanation of

“coincidences” among the model’s

parameters.

Not long after, Galileo’s homemade

telescope revealed the phases of Ve-

nus, Jupiter’s attendant satellites—a

“solar system” in miniature—and the

topography of the moon. The night

sky came to life as a showcase of tan-

gible, physical bodies rather than an

exercise in idealized points and imag-

inary spheres. When Isaac Newton

distilled the universal laws of motion

and gravity, he reunited the “big

data” approach of the Babylonians

and Ptolemy with the physics of

Aristarchus and Galileo, launching

truly modern science.

The big lesson is that big data

doesn’t interpret itself. Making math-

ematical models, trying to keep them

simple, connecting to the fullness of

reality and aspiring to perfection—

these are proven ways to refine the

raw ore of data into precious jewels

of meaning.

REVIEW

children go to school with the children of

similarly engaged and motivated parents.

To deny low-income families of color the

ability to self-select into safe and well-run

schools with high expectations is to impose

mediocrity on them, ostensibly for the public

good. It is a burden that no affluent family is

asked or expected to bear. Ms. Moskowitz in-

sists that even if she were allowed to, she

would not screen and handpick applicants in-

stead of admitting families by lottery. “I

wouldn’t do it,” she told me, “because I don’t

think I could tell who they are.” Perhaps not,

but she has created a mechanism for those

families to identify themselves.

Ms. Moskowitz’s many critics will look at

the small but non-trivial hurdles parents must

clear as proof that she is not running great

schools, merely a sorting mechanism. But this

ignores what’s most remarkable about Suc-

cess Academy: Its schools don’t just match

those of affluent suburban districts but easily

outperform them. Working with self-selected

families under careful conditions, Ms.

Moskowitz hasn’t

merely closed the

achievement gap.

She has reversed it.

The politics of

education reform

require that we be

less than candid

about all of this

self-sorting, but the

upshot for rich and

poor alike is clear:

School culture and

parent buy-in mat-

ter. The brand of

education pioneered

by Success Acad-

emy may indeed be

“not for everyone,” but its schools are well

run, not the joyless and militaristic hothouses

critics imagine. They serve much the same

role as Catholic schools did for previous gen-

erations of striving New Yorkers. Success

Academy suggests the upper limits of what is

possible when a critical mass of active and

engaged families of color, who happen to be

poor, are given permission to exercise the

same degree of choice as affluent families.

But this all must be done sotto voce. One

former Success Academy school leader whom

I interviewed struck a philosophical tone. “Is

it really such a bad thing that this is basically

an elite private school that admits by lot-

tery?” he asked. “It’s the first time folks in

the inner city have had that chance.”

It’s not a bad thing. The disparity of oppor-

tunity afforded to rich and poor Americans is

what must change. The privileged are unfet-

tered in their pursuit of an excellent educa-

tion for their children; the rest get “equity.”

Worse, we are forced to be dishonest in argu-

ments both for and against charter schools,

resorting to aspirational, politically pleasing

narratives about what it takes to improve

outcomes for disadvantaged children. It’s time

to stop airbrushing parents out of the picture

and to acknowledge the sometimes uncom-

fortable truth that their role is indispensable.

Mr. Pondiscio is senior fellow at the

Thomas B. Fordham Institute and teaches

at Democracy Prep Public Schools,

a charter school network in New York

City. This essay is adapted from his book

“How the Other Half Learns: Equity, Excel-

lence and the Battle Over School Choice,”

which will be published on Sept. 10

by Avery.

C

harter schools are a boutique

phenomenon in American educa-

tion, educating a mere 6% of U.S.

school children. But they attract

a disproportionate amount of at-

tention—and controversy—because of their

unique place in our education ecosystem.

Public, tuition-free schools open to all stu-

dents, but operated independently of school

districts, they offer a Rorschach test reveal-

ing how one feels about U.S. public education

at large. They can be perceived either as en-

gines of innovation and an indispensable

means to rescue children from failing neigh-

borhood schools, or as an existential threat

draining away resources—both money and

engaged families—from traditional public

schools.

Collectively, charter schools educate 3.2 mil-

lion children in 7,000 schools in 43 states and

the District of Columbia. None are more polar-

izing than New York City’s network of about 50

Success Academy schools, which serve 17,000

students—94% of whom are from minority

backgrounds—under their visionary and light-

ning-rod leader, Eva Moskowitz. Most are less

than a decade old, and all of

them are exceptionally high per-

forming. In a city where less than

40% of black and Hispanic chil-

dren test at proficiency for read-

ing or math, 90% of Success

Academy’s students of color

passed the most recent state

reading test. Virtually all of

them—over 98%—did so in math.

Test results should not be

the sole measure of school qual-

ity, but they’re how we often

keep score. By that standard,

there’s no such thing as a bad

Success Academy school. Its

very “worst” campus saw 85%

of its students pass last year’s

reading test, and in math the

worst was 92%—a level of qual-

ity and consistency unmatched

by any other large charter

school network in the U.S.

Success Academy does some-

thing else that’s unique and

mostly unnoticed, but it creates

the conditions that make these

results possible. By law, over-

subscribed charter schools must

admit students by lottery. Suc-

cess Academy has roughly six

applicants for every seat, which

gives the appearance of a ran-

domly selected student body.

But it exercises unusual influ-

ence over which students end

up actually enrolling. In the

end, the chances of an applicant

being offered a seat appear to

be closer to 50/50 than one-in-six.

Parents who win the lottery, and even

those whose children are only on the wait

list, must attend a series of mandatory meet-

ings and complete various administrative

steps for their applications to remain “active”

between the April lottery and the start of

school in August. Those who falter fall away.

At every step, school leaders aggressively

preach to prospective parents about their no-

nonsense culture and the expectation that

parents come with eyes wide open, fully com-

mitted to Success Academy’s program and

policies, including strict behavior codes,

school uniform compliance, supervising

homework, reading with children every night

and recording what’s read in a log. Parents

are warned repeatedly in unsparing language,

“Success Academy may not be for you.” Sig-

nificantly, the schools offer no transportation

or after-school programs, a potential deal

breaker for working single parents or those

without the support network to pick up and

drop off their children every day.

This process, whether by happenstance or

design, yields a parent body comprised

largely of the most motivated parents and

those with the organizational skills and re-

sources to meet Success Academy’s high bar

for parental engagement. This sets the stage

to strive for—and mostly achieve—consistent

and high levels of academic achievement “at

scale” among low-income children of color,

who would otherwise be lost to the dull hum

of mediocrity in zoned neighborhood schools.

This seems unfair—except for the fact that

the ability to self-select into a well-run, high-

performing school is unremarkable and un-

questioned among affluent Americans. When

well-off parents pay for their children to at-

tend a private or religious school, or when

they move into high-income ZIP codes where

inflated home prices and eye-popping prop-

erty taxes are de facto tuition for excellent

“public” schools, they are making the same

decision as the low-income parents drawn to

Success Academy. Both groups are voting

with their feet and committing their own re-

sources—money or time—to ensure that their

Top, ninth-grader Elliot Detou in a Success Academy

English class in March 2017. Above, Success

Academy founder Eva Moskowitz in August 2017.

Low-income families

‘self-select’ for

Success Academy’s

demanding program, with

remarkable results.

The Secret of a Charter

School’s Success? Parents

Success

Academy’s

schools

easily

outperform

those in

affluent

suburban

districts.

BYROBERTPONDISCIO