Virginia New Achievement Standards Based On Race And Background
Virginia's new achievement standards have raised eyebrows.
Part of the state's new standards dictate a specific percentage of racial group that should pass school exams, a move that has angered the Virginia Black Caucus. The caucus' chairwoman, Democratic state Sen. Mamie Locke, says the new standards marginalize students by creating different goals for students of various backgrounds.
"Nothing is going to work for me if there is a differentiation being established for different groups of students," Locke told the Daily Press. "Whether that's race, socio-economic status or intellectual ability. If there is a differentiation, I have a problem with it."
Virginia Secretary of Education Laura Fornash disagrees with Virginia Black Caucus' assertions.
"Please be assured that the McDonnell administration does not hold a student of a particular race or income level, or those of any other subgroup, to a different standard," Fornash wrote in a three-page letter explaining the changed standards.
The standards do not pose different pass rates for different groups: regardless of race, each student has to correctly answer the same number of test questions in order to pass. The difference lies in the expectation of passing from groups of different backgrounds. The new rules were designed as part of Virginia's waiver from No Child Left Behind, along with 31 other states and Washington, D.C.
For instance, only 45 percent of black students are required to pass the math state test while 82 percent for Asian Americans, 68 percent for whites and 52 percent for Hispanics are required to pass. In reading, 92 percent of Asian students, 90 percent of white students, 80 percent of hispanic students, 76 percent of black students, and 59 percent of students with disabilities are required to pass the state exam.
The state says these percentages are based on previous pass rates for the various groups, but many school officials aren't satisfied, saying that if the state expects less performance from a particular group of students, they will lose the motivation to perform better.
Educator Carolyn J. Smith told Pilot Online that the focus should be on boosting performance in underperforming racial groups rather than expecting less.
"The ones in the lower grades, if they don't feel like they can do math, they'll give up," Smith told Virginian-Pilot columnist Roger Chelsey, "And some parents say, 'I can't do math, either.'"
This belief then becomes a legacy, according to Smith, a cycle that one has to break as early as the child's first year in school.
The issue of black and Hispanic students underperforming their Asian and white counterparts might have more to do with segregation and expectations than ability.
According to author and presidential professor at the University of California, Los Angeles Jeannie Oakes eliminating traditional tracking methods that measure performance based on race is particularly important to guaranteeing equal success among different races.
“Once we put students in groups, we give them very different opportunities to learn -- with strong patterns of inequality across teachers, experience, and competence," Oakes says. "There was this pervasive view that Latino and African American kids can’t measure up in a way that more affluent or white kids can and we can’t do anything about it.”
If the standards are set this way, students as well as teachers begin believing and fulfilling the prophesy, according to author andfreelance writer Julie Halpert.
"...With little motive to succeed academically, the children didn’t get high grades or score well on standardized tests," Halpert says. "In other words, they performed exactly as the teachers predicted, in response to the climate of low expectations."
Instead, many educators believe "detracking" or "heterogeneous or mixed-ability grouping" ensures success across racial lines. Though the practice of detracking is still contested, some educators believe lowering expectations should simply not be an option.
Mary T. Christian, a career educator and member of the Hampton NAACP's education committee, said she's shocked at the low pass rates for some groups.
"Lower expectations are detrimental to students' growth," said Mary Christian, career educator as well as former state legislator. When you lower expectations, there is no challenge. Students and teachers will do the minimum."
The Source seems to have a video that has been region-blocked, so I didn't watch it.
Virginia's new achievement standards have raised eyebrows.
Part of the state's new standards dictate a specific percentage of racial group that should pass school exams, a move that has angered the Virginia Black Caucus. The caucus' chairwoman, Democratic state Sen. Mamie Locke, says the new standards marginalize students by creating different goals for students of various backgrounds.
"Nothing is going to work for me if there is a differentiation being established for different groups of students," Locke told the Daily Press. "Whether that's race, socio-economic status or intellectual ability. If there is a differentiation, I have a problem with it."
Virginia Secretary of Education Laura Fornash disagrees with Virginia Black Caucus' assertions.
"Please be assured that the McDonnell administration does not hold a student of a particular race or income level, or those of any other subgroup, to a different standard," Fornash wrote in a three-page letter explaining the changed standards.
The standards do not pose different pass rates for different groups: regardless of race, each student has to correctly answer the same number of test questions in order to pass. The difference lies in the expectation of passing from groups of different backgrounds. The new rules were designed as part of Virginia's waiver from No Child Left Behind, along with 31 other states and Washington, D.C.
For instance, only 45 percent of black students are required to pass the math state test while 82 percent for Asian Americans, 68 percent for whites and 52 percent for Hispanics are required to pass. In reading, 92 percent of Asian students, 90 percent of white students, 80 percent of hispanic students, 76 percent of black students, and 59 percent of students with disabilities are required to pass the state exam.
The state says these percentages are based on previous pass rates for the various groups, but many school officials aren't satisfied, saying that if the state expects less performance from a particular group of students, they will lose the motivation to perform better.
Educator Carolyn J. Smith told Pilot Online that the focus should be on boosting performance in underperforming racial groups rather than expecting less.
"The ones in the lower grades, if they don't feel like they can do math, they'll give up," Smith told Virginian-Pilot columnist Roger Chelsey, "And some parents say, 'I can't do math, either.'"
This belief then becomes a legacy, according to Smith, a cycle that one has to break as early as the child's first year in school.
The issue of black and Hispanic students underperforming their Asian and white counterparts might have more to do with segregation and expectations than ability.
According to author and presidential professor at the University of California, Los Angeles Jeannie Oakes eliminating traditional tracking methods that measure performance based on race is particularly important to guaranteeing equal success among different races.
“Once we put students in groups, we give them very different opportunities to learn -- with strong patterns of inequality across teachers, experience, and competence," Oakes says. "There was this pervasive view that Latino and African American kids can’t measure up in a way that more affluent or white kids can and we can’t do anything about it.”
If the standards are set this way, students as well as teachers begin believing and fulfilling the prophesy, according to author andfreelance writer Julie Halpert.
"...With little motive to succeed academically, the children didn’t get high grades or score well on standardized tests," Halpert says. "In other words, they performed exactly as the teachers predicted, in response to the climate of low expectations."
Instead, many educators believe "detracking" or "heterogeneous or mixed-ability grouping" ensures success across racial lines. Though the practice of detracking is still contested, some educators believe lowering expectations should simply not be an option.
Mary T. Christian, a career educator and member of the Hampton NAACP's education committee, said she's shocked at the low pass rates for some groups.
"Lower expectations are detrimental to students' growth," said Mary Christian, career educator as well as former state legislator. When you lower expectations, there is no challenge. Students and teachers will do the minimum."
The Source seems to have a video that has been region-blocked, so I didn't watch it.
The problem with NCLB is that they cut funding to schools that do poorly on tests, when they should be doing the opposite -- they should be INCREASING funding to schools that do poorly, so that these schools can hire more teachers, increase teachers' salaries (thereby attracting the best teachers to the schools that most need them), and fund after-school and weekend programs to tackle the multitude of social issues that these kids often face.
1) Standardized tests existed prior to NCLB. There were national standardized tests, but they used to take up a few days every 2-3 years in elementary school. In high school, there are the AP and IB programs, and SATs, ACTs, and SAT subject tests in just about every subject. The AP tests take two weeks in May, when students miss three hours of school per test. The other tests are held on Saturdays and don't disrupt the academic schedule at all. I'm not advocating getting rid of any of that. The point is that there's now more than enough standardized testing.
The mandatory testing done under NCLB eats up 5-10 school days per year. In my state, it's an average of six days a year in grades 3-10-- that's 48 days, or over two months of school. Add the time spent explicitly preparing for the tests, and the average kid is losing out on months of education.
You're in Canada. Ontario has the OAC program, which I believe comes with standardized exams. Not sure if the CEGEP program in Québec has similarly standardized courses.
2) Recognizing which schools are in trouble? There are DOZENS of measures that don't rely on standardized testing. Look at the four-year graduation rate. Look at the percentage of students accepted by four-year universities, and the percentage who STAY in university. Look at the percentage of students who enroll in AP or IB classes, and take those exams. Look at the pregnancy, STI, and crime rates.
In lower grades, look at the percentage of students reading at or above grade level. Look at participation in competitions like spelling bees and science fairs. Track how students do as they progress from elementary to middle to high school.
Better yet, look at some of the factors that affect school functionality, like student turnover and communication between the school and home. VERY easy to measure when so much takes place online.
3) NCLB doesn't cut funding-- it increases it, though not nearly enough. It also increases oversight and creates a paperwork nightmare. It's bad across the board; I teach in a high-performing school and the number of reports we have to submit to the government is so high that the district hired a full-time "compliance specialist." It also creates impossible hurdles-- no school, not even the "best," will ever get to 100% if they're committed to teaching every student, because not all students will be ready to meet that hurdle exactly when the test is administered. Some of the highest-performing schools nationwide, schools that do well on all the measures I mentioned above, aren't meeting AYP because they're at 99% one year and then 98.5% the next, which is considered failure.
Schools don't lose funding, they face takeover by the state, and being forced to fire at least 50% of the staff.
4) You keep mentioning "best" teachers. How do we determine who is "best"? How do we do this in a way that doesn't foster competition among teachers? When teachers are competing against each other, the students lose out. If I develop a kickass lesson plan, with interesting activities that make the subject matter meaningful, and I don't want another teacher to steal the title of "best" from me, I'm not going to share it. What HAS been proven to work is collaboration. If "best" is measured by my students' standardized test scores, you're going to see teachers in less-troubled schools rated better, and brought into the troubled schools, where their students' test scores will be lower, and then they'll be replaced themselves with teachers from less-troubled schools. This is already happening in places.
As I said, every single thing you've mentioned has already been tried, or is currently being tried. Schools are a reflection of the overall society. Teachers and administrators need support to do our jobs, on that I think we both agree. But the solutions require long-term commitment, stable school communities (not firing half the staff every year, and certainly not bringing in these "superman" administrators who did their two years in Teach For America and think they know everything), and building connections with the families of the students served.