This was supposed to be a great weekend. My son was getting a chance to bask in the rewards of those great experiences during his tenure at Michigan, which were made possible by his exploits at high school. But, my weekend was marred by revelations I received. And, the situation that ruined this weekend is not out of the ordinary- I believe this process obtains throughout most of this country. It is an absolute disaster. It must be stopped!
I have mentioned many times that when I resumed teaching at the college level, I was dismayed at the (non)quality of my students. I can- and do- take blame for not achieving my goals- but it is somewhat difficult when I am proffered a student that lacks basic skills. Which always made me wonder- who taught this child before? And, why was s/he allowed to go on to the next level?
Well, here in Alexandria, we have just one high school, T.C. Williams; the one you know about because of the movie “Remember the Titans”. Well, Titans may be the name for the sports teams, but with these kinds of policies, you can bet their academic moniker is closer to Lilliputian. I no longer wonder why students are not “making the grade” for the ‘Standards of Learning’ tests.
You see, while TC managed to have some 85% of its students graduate- and go on to fantastic schools, the other 15%… well, they didn’t graduate. And, that means the school is considered to be a failing one. Even though so many of their students truly excelled.
So, it is now the policy of this high school that NO child obtains a zero on an exam. If s/he fails to turn in the paper or fails to complete even one question correctly, the lowest grade is a 40 or 50. Incompletes- don’t worry about it! And, with the way they’ve dissected the various aspects of grading, it’s nigh impossible to fail a student or “leave him (or her) behind”.
Yes, if a child never gets above a zero (oh, wait, 50) on every exam, but does his (her) homework, is not a problem in class, that child is not flunked out. Nope, s/he gets a C. If the person doesn’t do the homework and gets no exam questions right, s/he might get something as low as a D. (Horrors!) It certainly explains why kids in my university classes did not comprehend when I- and other profs- expected them to perform to earn a grade!
Now, isn’t that just special? No wonder kids reach the next class level unable to perform. They are never called into account, never held responsible, and just passed on… Of course, the teacher must be at fault- after all this child in the next level can’t perform at grade level- how did s/he get there?
And, at the lower school levels in Alexandria, they are no longer getting grades as you and I know them. Nope! Now, elementary school kids come home with “performing as expected, performing better than expected, not performing as expected, or not performing”. This kind of grading was the norm in the Commonwealth of Virginia back when they had no desire to let Black children go to school with White children. Given that they have no expectations Blacks would perform at all, any performance would be outstanding! Which is what I found out when some folks I hired could not read a lick! (And, why we color coded our labels and taught them to read!)
Oh, which brings up a new method the stats are being adjusted. Our community has more than a few immigrants from Africa. And, these immigrants do pretty well in the schools. Which is why they have now been classified as African-American…
I don’t know about you, but this is not the way I wanted my kids graded. (Oh, they weren’t. This is the new ‘enlightened’ [read dimly-lit] school board policy.) No wonder we are, indeed, leaving our students behind- in performance, but not in grade.
I’m hoping this will make all of us examine what the heck is going on in our neighborhood schools. And, eradicate the inane, insane, and profane policy of this political correctness.
Hi Roy,
My grandson was in a private school from age 2 – 14 where every class subject had a check sheet for each learning section. The students progressed at their own pace, and when the check sheet was complete they took an exam. Any missed QUESTIONS were restudied. Hence, the students got 100% all the way up. Great solution for the public schools, in my opinion. When a student misses something in first grade, or any grade, that will follow him his whole life. No need for that when there is a simple solution – what a waste to wait till the end of the year or even the end of a semester to find out a “grade”.
We had modules of instruction, but no one was stopped from progressing. It just meant that they had multiple modules to master, should they fail to do so on first pass. And, if enough modules were not completed, neither was the grade. I fear that such a system today would mean they would pass the soul with only one module under his/her belt- which would prove nothing- and does nothing.
As I mentioned to Chef William, this also has terrible import upon our businesses, since children so taught have no concept that continued employment and promotions are not related to showing up- but to performance and effort.
So glad you grandson got that great benefit of education.
And, thanks for your visit and comment. I hope to “see” more of you in the future!
I think the idea is to move them along until they must get out into the world for real. At that time we will put them on welfare and other programs so that they do not need a passing grade, if you can sign an X for a name, you pass. Now there is an upside to all this. The people that run the government are happier when they a ruling over a bunch of dummies. Much easier to do what you want at the top while fooling those at the bottom. It goes beyond sad…….
Chef William recently posted..Fish for Lunch
I believe you are right in the end, Chef William- even if that were not the officially stated intent. It explains further the attitudes of the child- now adult- who has no concept that there is no reward for just showing up; effort is required. So, even if they are not totally illiterate, employers are subjected to dealing with staff who feel that performance is immaterial. After all, they got there by doing nothing. Why would/should the rules be changed now?