Here's an interesting tidbit from Thursday's Atlanta Urinal and Constipation.
More than 90 percent of Georgia's third-graders passed a high-stakes reading exam this year, turning out a better-than-expected performance.
Better than expected? One out of every ten kids couldn't read at the third grade level and this is better than expected? WTF? What kind of expectations are these? If maybe it was one out of fifty that would be good news but one out of ten? No wonder Georgia ranks number 50 in SAT scores if this is considered good news.
But thousands of students still failed and could be held back if they don't perform well on a summer retest.
Thousands failed! Thousands!
About 11,000 of the state's estimated 115,000 third-graders failed the reading portion of the Georgia Criterion-Referenced Competency Test, according to preliminary information provided Wednesday by state Superintendent of Schools Kathy Cox.
That is alarming! So let's see one out of ten failed and could be held back. That means if one in ten failed in my third grade class of thirty students at Goodall Elementary School in Webster Groves, Missouri, three people would have been held back. That didn't happen. Back then, teachers actually taught. Today, they say thirty students is too much for a teacher. We need smaller class sizes. Somehow, when I went to school they taught with larger class sizes and durned if everyone didn't seem to learn. Of course, we didn't have teachers' unions back then. We also didn't have the huge bureaucracy of the Department of Education. Thanks Jimmah Carter.
Based on previous scores, Cox had predicted that as many as 26,000, or 23 percent, of Georgia third-graders could fail the make-or-break exam this year. She credited the improved performance to teachers' greater emphasis on reading in the early grades, better identification of weak skills through practice testing and extra help for struggling readers.
No wonder they're ecstatic about only one out of ten failing the test. They expected almost one out of four to fail it. Holy shit! Those are really high expectations.
Naturally, some people don't think the test is a good idea.
But educators and researchers have long debated the validity of using a single exam to make such an important decision as which child gets promoted to the next grade. Not all parents agree with the policy, either."I think the classroom teacher knows best about what a student can achieve," said Katie Hasty of Suwanee, whose son Wesley passed the test. "I just feel like if parents are involved and administrators are involved, then teachers will be accountable without a test."
The magic words: If parents are involved. But how many parents want to see their little Justin held back. What people don't seem to understand is if a child cannot read at the third grade level he will start lagging behind in the fourth grade and he will only do worse.
Students who have not passed the reading exam may attend summer school and take a retest. Children who fail the retest must return to third grade, unless a teacher or parent wins an appeal.
So the child can attend summer school and if he/she works hard enough can move on to fourth grade. No matter what liberals say, this is good policy. Dammit! This used to be the policy, except we didn't have the test. Back then we didn't worry about the student's self esteem. If the student could not do the work, the student repeated the grade.
The future of this country lies in an educated populace. The key to education is being able to read. For example, at TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name), the only education I can get is if a particular class is taught in Atlanta. No travel allowed. As a result, I have had to teach myself most of what I know. That means cracking open a book and reading and trying to figger out what the technical writer was trying to say when he wrote it.
I had a friend who was a technical writer and he was told to write it at a tenth grade reading level. They actually have programs that you can run your text through to determine the reading level of your stuff and suggesting simpler words.
As far as I'm concerned this elation about 90% of the third graders passing the test is bullshit. If the number were 98% that would be cause for celebration. But 90% is unacceptable! Especially when we rank 50th on SAT scores.
We can and should do better.
Posted by denny at June 4, 2004 08:22 PMSeems reading difficulties extend to reporters at CNN. Check this our:
CNN has listed potentional VP selections that Kerry has. Among them was this:
Bill Clinton
Few vice-presidential possibilities boast the accomplished resume -- or political baggage -- of former President Bill Clinton. Clinton studied at Georgetown, Yale and Oxford (as a Rhodes scholar) before returning to his home state of Arkansas. He taught at the University of Arkansas' law school for three years before, at 30, being elected the state's attorney general. Clinton later served six terms as Arkansas' governor (he won in 1978, lost a 1980 race, then was re-elected two years later), before defeating incumbent George H.W. Bush to become U.S. president, starting in January 1993. While federal law prohibits a person from seeking a third presidential term, the Constitution does not specify whether or not a former commander in chief can become vice president.
Ummm...yo, you at CNN, Try reading The Constitution!
Amendment XII
The electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate;--The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;--the person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President. The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
Posted by: Sailor in the Desert on June 5, 2004 08:33 AMSailor - I've pointed that out to a few liberals who thought Bubba would be a good vice presidential candidate. The Constitution? WTF is that? Gah! The ignorance in this country is alarming!
Posted by: Denny Wilson on June 5, 2004 11:54 AMSailor: You don't think CNN was refering to the United States Constitution do you? You can't take that for granted with the liberal media, they might refer to the EU constitution. (they wish we were part of the EU but then they wouldn't have America to blame for all thats wrong in the world.They can't win for losing, so they just misinform.)
Denny: My wife is a teacher here in PA and you should hear her colleagues bitch about the accountability that "no child left behind" requires in PA. These educated liberal elite teachers (not my wife, the liberal part anyway) blame Bush when its the state's responsibility to set guidelines. NO ONE at her school knew the state was setting guidelines! They all make around $75,000 and feel that they shouldn't be forced to be accountable for anything but showing up and getting more degrees so they can make more money. (sorry for rambling but I'm sick of these assholes complaining all the time)
Maybe some Democrat surfing the web or someone who's knowledgeable about the legislation can explain this to me: Is No Child Left Behind really the unfunded mandate teachers keep labeling it as? I mean, haven't there been conservative complaints about how Bush has hiked funding for the Department of Education? And does it require new standardized tests, or is info gathered off the current standardized tests kids are currently taking?
I say this because as far as I can tell, what the law does is cut off federal funding for schools that don't meet specific requirements for their students in standardized/state tests. I'm guessing that it bases its data off current tests, so it seems the complaints about a lack of funding just comes from teachers that want more federal funding for education cuz they think it'll help them meet the current requirements. Other than that, I haven't heard of anything contained within the legislation that absolutely requires drastic new funding...
Posted by: Eric on June 5, 2004 11:31 PMAnd, I'm not surprised at the CNN thing. Most people today only care about the Constitution when they're using it to distort "equal rights" and "separation of church and state."
Posted by: Eric on June 5, 2004 11:32 PMIt is really sad that so called professional reportes cannot take the time to research before they shoot their mouths off. The ignorance is very scarry, Denny.
Since the EU constitution has not been ratified as of yet, and may not be, I was thinking it was the US Constitution they were referring to, though I could be wrong.
The No Child Left Behind mandate is not unfunded as some would have you believe. The problem lies in the teaching method, something called 'Whole Language'.
Posted by: Sailor in the Desert on June 6, 2004 02:21 AMReading is VERY important, yet as was implied in another post above, dull, ignorant pawns are the desired ACTUAL outcome of today's public-school system. Oh, and they're second to PAID TEACHERS as outcome number UNO.
Am finishing my 12th book since January, in the Rich Dad, Poor Dad series. Wow! He really NAILS the school systems for their bias, ignorance and misdirected efforts. And these are their GOOD points!
Posted by: Sharps Shooter on June 6, 2004 11:32 AMI'm all about blaming government for as much as possible, however I know too many lazy parents to let nanny take all of the heat.
If parents continue to treat schools as though they are daycare centers, that is all they will ever be.
Posted by: Key on June 7, 2004 02:30 PMKey - I agree. That's why I emphasized those magic words "If parents are involved".
Sharps Shooter - I couldn't agree more. I was a voracious reader as a child. I still am. Both my sister and I usually were graded with reader skills four grades higher than the one we were in. It helped that both my parents were readers and they read to us before we started reading. It is not uncommon for me to be reading three books at the same time.