Well, obviously the described abuses of the school are wrong, if true. But the education system wasn’t working before, either.
I do think schools should have some accountability and that includes testing. Class valedictorians were showing up at 4 year universities unable to write at a high school level - I know because I tutored them to help prepare them for college level English classes. They felt like it was a hoax because they were at the top of their class in high school, straight A’s.
When schools began using graduation exams, cries of racism emerged along with the statistics - fewer Hispanics and African Americans were graduating. Yet when students graduated regardless of whether they could read or write, cries of racism emerged when statistics revealed an obvious difference in economic outcome for school graduates; if they all graduated from high school, why were minorities making less money? Instead of correctly identifying differences in education levels attained, the difference was attributed to racism.
I don’t want schools to abuse teachers. I don’t like Common Core. But the arguments against them are no different from the arguments fielded against any attempts at accountability in decades gone by.
I used to read Education Weekly every week. Every issue featured a “new” education approach on the cover. Then the following week that approach would drop from the radar, never to be heard of again (with the exception of scandal) and a “new” approach to educating students would replace it on the cover. Child centered education (self-esteem focused) wasn’t working. I don’t think testing is the problem; any tool employed by teachers can likewise be abused by administration.
The path ahead....needs to be a simplified tests that a 10th grader can take, and if successful...they are graduated there on the spot, and at sixteen, move onto local community college. We could take ten percent of the kids and move them on easily. Repeat the same situation in the eleventh grade, and thirty percent of them would likely move on. We could then concentrate on the punks who have issues and simply get them to a point of being acceptable to graduate.
I’m always amazed how sincere, dedicated conservatives seek to reform and reform the most Marxist institution in our country’s history instead of demolishing it.