Posted on 11/17/2014 9:20:03 AM PST by rightistight
The South Orange-Maplewood School District in New Jersey will be likely lowering their standards for AP classes after a successful lawsuit brought by the Department of Education.
The DoE brought the suit to weaken South Orange-Maplewood's practice of "tracking," or placing students in separate educational paths to suit their needs. Proponents of tracking believe that it helps all students; not only will educators teach students at their level, but it will prevent large classes in which students of different needs are taught all at once.
The DoE and opponents of tracking believe it promotes "segregation," by favoring white students and putting minority students on a path of underachievement and failure.
The suit was brought by the DoE after it found that African Americans were "underrepresented" in South Orange-Maplewood's AP classes. The school has a large number of black students, yet only a small percent of African Americans are placed in AP classes.
Interestingly, the DoE's suit did not say that these students' grades were appropriate for AP classes; they simply stated that, because there were many black students in the school, about the same number should be in advanced classes. Race is the issue, not that students who have high grades are being prevented from getting into AP classes because of their race.
Because of the DoE's decision, South Orange-Maplewood has removed nearly all tracking from their Elementary and Middle School and is "looking into whether to reduce the rigid requirements that are currently in place for a student to move into a higher level class."
(Excerpt) Read more at thepunditpress.com ...
Every white student should transfer out. The DoE just destroyed another school system.
This one requires a third fp.
Local school district sort of has AP classes which are essentially regular classes with AP participants having more different and extra work.
The real smart ones are sent to the local community college.
The kids in the class still have to take the test. It sucks if they can’t do the work, or hold back the rest of the class’s progress. Are 4’s and 5’s on the AP test next to go because high grades are racist?
Remember, the purpose of these tests isn’t to get meaningless credentials. Rather, it’s to educate relatively talented students to the point where they can place some of the introductory college courses and move on.
Honors and High Honors have been removed from my son’s Middle School report cards.
Remember the days when Honor Roll names were posted in the school office or lobby ?
No more..
OK, well when I was in school 30 years ago, AP classes were designed to give you a head start at college. If you paid to take the exam and passed it, you received a credit for that class.
But isn’t that what they’re proposing? Making the qualifying tests easier?
Amazing!
Remember, these are the folks whose view of the world rejects objective reality.
Governor Christy could ride this issue into the White House!
How much non-elected ARROGANCE do we need?
I wish they had had tracking when I was in high school. The last 2 years were a total waste of time because of all the people there who did not want to learn and who did nothing but disrupt classes. And there were very few African American students at my high school. The majority of these dolts were white because the majority of the school was white.
I am a big believer in segregated (by grades and interest) classes in high school. Otherwise what is the point of being there? It would be better if a third of the students were not even there as they actively did not want to be and wanted everyone to know it. They were only there because they were required by law to be there. Most only disrupted classes and caused trouble.
Compulsory public education should end at age 16. There is no point in forcing people to be in public school who do not want to be there and are not the slightest bit interested in learning.
No, not yet. As I read it, they are talking about getting into the AP class easier for kids who aren’t on the high-achieving college tracks. Perhaps a dozen years ago, my kids were in some AP classes. They told me, especially in math, that it was common for the parents to browbeat the teachers to let their kids in (even though they were mediocre students). They almost always soon flunked out.
This is similar. “Tracking” is so racist.
Tracking doesn’t change the difficulty of the courses or the text. Leave that to Common Core. /S
Dumbing down.
Shouldn’t white parents sue for this racist reverse discrimination? White students must not be allowed to achieve high standards because they’re white?
Of course nobody can just be honest about the situation; black families place less importance on education, period. You *CANNOT* force equal outcomes, maybe they should address the “why” and not punish those that value education.
When this kind of stupidity comes from the Federal government you can see the writing on the wall...civilization unravels. They don’t see “Americans”, just whites/blacks/women/gays - identity politics with everything. I wish black communities would stop being black communities - it promotes racism, on both sides.
Wow, just wait until colleges get wind of this.
They have. Witness ‘developmental’ courses for the unprepared.
IOW, that school system’s administrators are saying “It is not possible for non-white students to meet white standards, therefore it is unfair to enforce white standards”.
Last time I looked, they were not white standards, they were simply standards. Tell me again who the racists in society are?
AP classes are racist now... okay, I guess a person who can’t spell CAT should join the AP class if he is Amish. I guess there’s another reason to homeschool.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.