Matatouille - Thought, Opinion, Nonsense, Etc.

Nelson and I are both high school teachers, so it shouldn't be a huge shock when one of us writes about it. But I do have a few thoughts that could sort of look like I've got an axe to grind....

Well, if I do have an axe, it must be pretty damn sharp.

But here's the long and the short of it. You may not be aware of this, but there are movements in educational thought. They tend to last somewhere 10 years or longer. These days, the buzzword is accountability. The would be swell if it were the students being held accountable. But usually, it's not. Usually, it's the schools and teachers.

You know all those standardized tests kids have to take? Well, while they are given a score for them, it often doesn't affect thier grade. But it does affect the school big-time, and sometimes, the teachers.

Now, in all fairness, some of this is having a positive affect. And so is the high school exit exam here in California. (One instance of the kids being held accountable.) I think these things are good.

But I'll give you a great example of the school accountability not working. I've been teaching 9th grade English almost my entire teaching career so far. That's about 8 years now. In that time, most of my incoming freshman (that's 9th graders, about 14 yrs old) have tested at 3rd-4th grade reading level, sometimes even lower, with similiar writing skills.

Yes, you heard that right. A huge percentage of my students, as incoming 9th graders are about 5-6 years behind in their skills. Horrifying, isn't it? How is this possible? How can this happen, I hear people muttering. It's actually pretty simple. Social promotion. That's what it's called when kids don't learn all the skills they're supposed to in a certain grade, but are then passed on anyway. I know, it's insane.

And at least in California, that really is a huge part of what's going wrong. But do they address it? No. It's too hard. They tried once, about 7 years ago. But it was a half-hearted effort. They figured out how many kids they'd have to hold back. (It was well over half the student in most grades.) So, they gave up.

Now, that's just here in Southern California. But all over the nation, due to No Child Left Behind's rules, the philosophy is the same. If something's wrong, if things don't measure up, penalize the school. And as we all know a little too well, when you put a big pile of feces up on a the top of a great big bleeping hill, it tends to roll down, doesn't it?

It's actually good that the schools are held accountable, to a degreee. But meanwhile, the kids aren't, and year after year nothing changes.

So, if this students are so far behind, why isn't something being done? Good question. First of all, something is. It's just way, way too little. But the major thing is, that kids, like most other people are lazy. And if they can get away with not doing work they will.

What may be even worse, is that we have been training kids, educating them, if you will, that if they do something wrong, they won't be held accountable, that it'll be ok. Nothing will happen.

Which of course isn't true. Once they get out of school, if they break a law they could go to jail. If they do poor work, they will be fired. But they haven't been shown that. And unless something drastic changes, we'll go on doing things the same way.

It's depressing I know.

And what may be even worse is that I've tried, several times to contact the L.A. Times to get somebody to write a story on it. I've even submitted columns on it myself.

How can this not be a huge story. Kids getting to 9th grade, ROUTINELY, like the it's the most normal thing in the world, with 3rd grade skills.

Well, at least you, my dear reader, are aware.

Finally, it would be easy to just cite incompetance and curse somebody under your breath, but that doesn't help too much. Politicians made these rules with very little input from teachers. Because everybody know that teachers are what's wrong with education, right? Well, that's how we go to this situation. And that's how we got to this situation, teachers blamed for the decisions of politicians. Unfortunately, it's just going on and on.