This is exactly the kind of thing that people feared would happen with standardized testing--schools focusing on the test rather than the student. Not good.
I also believe it calls into question the integrity of Mr. Paige.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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Great article. This news has been coming out in dribs and drabs for a couple of years, with small articles calling into question specific aspects of the Houston school district. It is nice to see a longer article dealing with it more as a collective whole.
Of course, Paige should be held directly accountable and forced to resign. Further, No Child Left Behind should be eliminated entirely, as its only success is on paper only from a district that manipulated the numbers.
Will it happen? Probably not until NCLB proves that it cannot work nationwide and our national education system has crumbled even further.
It would be nice if NCLB was put on hold indefinitely until an audit could be performed of the entire Texas school system. Analyze the microcosmic experiment, finally realize that it failed miserably, then decide whether you want to force that program on the rest of the country - most of which had better results before NCLB than Houston had after it.
Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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*nod* We've seen stuff like this coming for over two years. I wouldn't've anticipated outright fraud, but I'm saddened to say that I'm not surprised by it.
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I don't believe in the 1% dropout rate, but I'm just as disinclined to believe the between 25 and 50% drop out rate pointed out by the 60 Minutes II experts.
If I recall, wasn't the one percent based on the fact that students actually had to show up for a certain amount of time before there were actually considered students (and could then actually be considered drop-outs)? Students who dopped out in a matter of days or didn't return for a year weren't counted for some reason or another...
::ponders what it would have been like had half his school dropped out::
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If you read the article, even some of the people who think NCLB is a great plan think the dropout rate is closer to 50% -- which is pretty typical for inner city schools.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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quote: It is a terrible mistake to push children into the next grade before they are ready for the academic rigors of that grade
I disagree. I can think of nothing more damaging than keeping a person back, year after year. So they don't pass. So they have to take the course again, but that doesn't mean can get stuck in grade nine for two or three years! That doesn't mean they can be made to take a course more than once, even though they passed. These students are almost adults, it must be humiliating to be treated like their successes don't actually count.
For children, this may be a different case, but for teenagers, I think it is important that they be treated like young adults.
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I think this is on the order of the Enron scandal in terms of it's deliberate malfeasance. The fact that it turned into a lucrative government job for the perpetrator means, to me, that the entire system is corrupt.
Forget firing the man (Paige), he should be facing charges.
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His response is a link on the website. He claims to have been totally unaware that people were feeding him bad information.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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And there's a reason why Howard Dean said that Vermont shouldn't take the federal package that came with NCLB, because the standards put in place has ruined Vermont's education system. My former high school has been faced with combining social studies with english making a single "humanities" course to cut costs. Even with that, they've had to cut back already-meager programs.
Posts: 903 | Registered: May 2003
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Now, if Dean came out and said that he would totally eliminate the NCLB bill if he were elected, or at least work toward that goal, that might go a ways toward my considering to vote for him.
Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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On Dean: It's coming, I'm sure. CBS only did their report on Sunday, and I havn't heard much from the stump since Howard made those nasty comments about Congress.
Oh wait, they scurry about like cockroaches, they aren't cockroaches themselves. [edit] I maintain that Dean's web page should have a prominent red button labeled, "Wait, I can explain!" that links to a page wherein Dean explains his latest slip of the tounge. He needs it.
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Pssst, FlyingCow, about Dean and NCLB (BTW, he's been saying this from the beginning of his campaign, or at least since the rally I went to in Boston in September, and I'm reasonably sure he was talking about it last May or June).
However, I think if you really cared, you'd have attempted the 15 minute Google search (or in my case, the 30 seconds it took to type 'www.deanforamerica.com', click on 'On the Issues', then 'Education, and read the first two paragraphs of the rather banal statement on education, which was largely negative to NCLB, or scrolled down a bit and found the link directly to Dean's comment's on NCLB. Heck, it took longer to type this than to find it! )
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The trick, Bok, is that I don't really care. Truly. Dean has done nothing to make me care for him one way or another.
Not that it matters at this point, since I'm not registered Democrat and can't vote in a primary election anyway. I sort of have to wait to see who I'll be allowed to vote for.
Further, my vote really means nothing anyway, since I live in New Jersey, which will send its electoral votes to whichever of the Democrat candidates emerges from the primary. I could vote for Bush, or anyone else for that matter, and it wouldn't make one lick of a difference.
Dean seems more concerned about other issues (read: health care, taxes and Iraq) than education, at least by reading his "Welcome" page. Even the most recent press release talks about funding NCLB rather than doing away with it. In fact, his "reform" of NCLB outlined in a press release, does little to improve the situation.
It seems as though he wants his own version of NCLB that is equally unrealistic. His changes? Evaluate students in different ways, fund the program and build more schools. How about tossing the program entirely?
Now that I've done a little looking, toss the idea of voting for Dean.... again, it's not like New Jersey'd elect anyone other than him, anyway. Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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I don't see how you can simply say that his "reforms" of NCLB won't change things either way. Maybe they won't, but maybe they will, do you have anything deeper in the way of analysis or evidence?
He says we need to fund it, because the law is on the books, and it is causing problems, some of which may be ameliorated by funding. I think that statement you link to says that there needs to be some big changes to the law itself; but even if the law is bad in itself, it's still worse to pass a law like this, and then provide no assistance to implement it.
--- I'm sorry, but it just irks me to see someone type, "If only So-And-So said this about that, I'd be interested," especially when the answers are very easy to find. On the other hand, if someone's position isn't actually going to do much either way, why say it will?
---
Oh and WheatPuppet? I still am waiting for a big red button on whitehouse.gov that says, "Iraqi invasion justification of the week" I think we're both going to be disappointed
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Bok, the law is bad. Funding it will not make it any less bad. Changing the testing aspect around won't make it any less bad. It's rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.
We have too few teachers - not too few qualified teachers, just too few in the first place. The teachers we have are rapidly retiring, leaving countless vacancies in schools. Those teachers that aren't retiring are many times burned out and only still around because tenure prevents their removal. New teachers aren't drawn to the profession because the excessive red tape and beaurocracy, the low pay and the heavy responsibility.
Making it {i]more[/i] difficult to become and stay a teacher is not the answer. Making more layers of paperwork for teachers is not the answer. NCLB does nothing to fix the tenure problem, or the way school budgets are dealt with, or the overreliance on testing.
Saying "we'll make this program work after some reforms!" is like saying "we can stop the Earth's rotation if we all just run really fast in one direction". It's not going to happen. Saying you can fix it is meaningless. Saying you're going to do away with it entirely, that's a different story.
Come up with a new method. Replace NCLB with something that works, that addresses the problem. Don't keep driving down the road after you see the Dead End sign - turn around.
If anything, it's good that NCLB isn't getting funding. Without funding, it's making people more angry and pushing the problem to a point where the law might be overturned. Fund it, and it'll linger and do even more damage... it's like leaving bits of food out for the hungry bear that's destroying your kitchen. Without food, he'll go away - now he's gonna start checking the closets.
...
If Dean's position was the above, I might take a harder look at the rest of his platform. I don't like much of it, but then, I don't like much of Bush's either. Presidential elections are always the lesser of two evils. Which person will drive the country faster to ruin.
But again, Dean doesn't have to say anything of the sort, because he's not looking for my vote. None of the candidates are. They aren't getting the word out independents in states like NJ, Massachusettes, Wyoming or the like... those states are locks for one party or the other.
Which is sad in itself, that there are only two options that can ever be considered using our current system. If we tossed parties and the electoral college, maybe voting would mean a little more.
Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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Yeah, that's interesting. The chorus "Don't blame me, I voted for Nader" is giving me less and less comfort.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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No, it's a bad thing it isn't even getting funding, because it's still a law, and still has to be implemented in some form. If the federal government isn't going to fund it's own mandates, the money still has to come from somewhere... An art program, after-school flag-football, a chess club, whatever.
Believe me, I'm the son of an elementary school teacher, so I'd sooner see the NCLB get shredded, than actually work with it (although, as a president, it's generally easier to work with an existing law than repeal an old one). Short of that, it doesn't seem completely unreasonable to perhaps be a little centrist and promote reforms within the law, while funding it to remove some of the hard choices local schools are having to make due to this stupid law plus its lack of funding. This also doesn't completely alienate those who are ambivalent or slightly favor some sort of testing criterion for school and student evaluation.
All these politicians ARE trying to get elected, after all.
Posts: 7021 | Registered: Nov 1999
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I dunno, it's like trying to reform Stalin's purges. Wellll.... we'll cut back on 30% of the genocide, how's that suit you?
As a teacher, I know my voice isn't heard in Washington. My voice isn't even heard in my union, because they have their own political agenda that has very little wiggle room. NCLB will destroy the education system as we know it, if allowed to continue unchecked. Like the leaning tower of Pisa, NCLB is building the future on an unstable foundation and will topple over without major, unnatural supports that do nothing to save the usability of the structure.
You've got the wildly liberal progressive teaching styles being taught in the universities meeting strict conservative standards for performance. Both sides are running away from the center, leaving many students to fend for themselves.
It's true, they are trying to get elected. Unfortunately, that's *all* many of them are trying to do. Who cares what I do to the country, as long as I can sell it and win another term.
In a twisted way, it helps politicians in the long run to cripple the education system. A well informed, thinking, reasoned populace would be less likely to fall for their spindoctoring. A population that can't read or write relies on sound bytes and doesn't correspond with their officials. Maybe this is a vast conspiracy to maintain the oligarchal holding pattern we've been in for a couple of decades.
Regardless, the problems are larger than NCLB. The kids are just getting caught in the grinder. It's politics as usual, with no one really fighting to improve the situation - only fighting to beat the other guy and make him look bad.
Hey, anyone know when that manned flight to Mars takes off? I wanna get me a ticket.
Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
I've been digesting this, literally perhaps, and it seems like how the USDA food pyramid produced Snackwells and healthy choice fat-free cookies. You can kill people without actually having bad intentions.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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