Discipline incidents: What kind of incidents? Are they the usual student pranks or do they amount to something more serious? Keeping these categories separate is important. When they are put together, they skew the picture of a school as either a safer or more violent place. Plus, parents need to ask how schools handle disciplinary problems when they do take place.

Attendance and Tardiness: These numbers say a lot about the morale of the school and the attentiveness of staff to student attitudes and behaviors. These are numbers that provide the initial clues to later dropout rates.

Class Size: There will probably always be conflicting studies about class size. Does it make a difference or not? The results of these studies depend on what the researchers believe making a difference consists of. As a longtime teacher and parent, I do not need more research to tell me that smaller classes are better. It doesn't take genius to know that putting more mature adults next to immature children is a good idea. We all want to send our children to schools where they are names and not numbers.

Strength of Parent Involvement at the School: It's vital to know: Is this a school where parents and teachers care about being involved in a cooperative effort? How many parents come to PTA and other school-related meetings? How many parents show up at parent-teacher conferences? How many volunteers are involved with the school?

Experience of Educators at the School: What is the average teacher salary at the school? What is the average number of years these teachers have taught? Are staff development and in-service trainings offered? Ideally, a school has a combination of older and younger staff so that they can learn from and energize each other.

Grading Practices at the School: Is this a school where lots of kids get A's or is this a school where lots of kids get low grades? Unlike test scores, grades are not often discussed except when critics bemoan grade inflation. Grading patterns along with test scores tell a big story about the school.

Student Aspirations and School Support: At the secondary level, numbers about student hopes and school support are revealed in dropout rates. But beyond those are the numbers detailing how many students from this school go on to college, and how many and what kinds of advanced placement classes are offered. These are the kinds of numbers that schools know and need to share.

Test Results: Test scores are useful but only when results come back to schools in a timely fashion (i.e. before the school year is out). How many months go by between the taking of and the return of the tests? Are the results used to help children master what they have not yet learned before they move on? These are questions about tests that a growing number of parents care about and need to ask. For children to get the benefit of high-priced tests (Let's not kid ourselves, tests cost a lot of money.) test results need to come back ASAP for teaching/learning purposes.