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What? I'm saying that dropping standards doesn't solve anything. Relabeled incompetence is still incompetence. If solving whatever is keeping these students be

by ori_b 14y ago

What? I'm saying that dropping standards doesn't solve anything. Relabeled incompetence is still incompetence. If solving whatever is keeping these students behind has something to do with race, so be it. Let's address the racial issues. But dropping standards on black/latino/... students is just a way of saying "We don't think you blacks are able to perform at the same level as asians, so we'll give you a free pass. After all, we can't expect too much from you." Yes, actually educating children is hard. Giving them the help they need to perform well isn't a walk in the park. But isn't it worthwhile?

anigbrowl 14y ago
They're not dropping standards as far as I can see. They're setting goals for relative improvement. If blue people average 40% on tests and green people average 60%, and after a year those scores have increased to 50% and 70%, respectively, one group has seen a 25% improvement and the other a ~17% improvement. Yes, actually educating children is hard. But isn't it worthwhile? Of course it's worthwhile. What are you trying to say, that I don't want to educate them? If we posit only a single standard for k-12, what happens when some children fail to reach it is that the educators and parents end up in mutual recrimination. We've tried the one-size-fits-all approach for years and it doesn't work that well in practice.
- ori_b 14y ago
  The article said that the passing rates were scaled by race. This is a horrible idea.
  - anigbrowl 14y ago
    It would be, if all kids were mythical blank slates of equal ability. But all the evidence is that they're not; they carry in a lot of economic and cultural baggage. To quote the superintendent of public instruction, 'So why do we have these different subgroups? Because we're starting with black children where they are. We can't start them at the 82 percentile because they're not there.' It'd be nice to say that a 100% pass rate is the only acceptable outcome, but the reality is that you can't achieve that in the short term. So you can either a) label everyone who falls short a failure from the outset, or b) set realistic goals for different groups, allocate resources accordingly, and aim to reduce the gap every year until the passing rates for different groups converge to less than a single standard deviation. It doesn't matter whether you're looking at scores or passing rates. Your objective is year-on-year improvement. I think this is both more honest and more desirable than declaring educational institutions to be 'failing schools' and tarnishing the reputation of everyone who works or attends those schools.

by ori_b 14y ago

anigbrowl 14y ago

They're not dropping standards as far as I can see. They're setting goals for relative improvement. If blue people average 40% on tests and green people average 60%, and after a year those scores have increased to 50% and 70%, respectively, one group has seen a 25% improvement and the other a ~17% improvement. Yes, actually educating children is hard. But isn't it worthwhile? Of course it's worthwhile. What are you trying to say, that I don't want to educate them? If we posit only a single standard for k-12, what happens when some children fail to reach it is that the educators and parents end up in mutual recrimination. We've tried the one-size-fits-all approach for years and it doesn't work that well in practice.

ori_b 14y ago
The article said that the passing rates were scaled by race. This is a horrible idea.
- anigbrowl 14y ago
  It would be, if all kids were mythical blank slates of equal ability. But all the evidence is that they're not; they carry in a lot of economic and cultural baggage. To quote the superintendent of public instruction, 'So why do we have these different subgroups? Because we're starting with black children where they are. We can't start them at the 82 percentile because they're not there.' It'd be nice to say that a 100% pass rate is the only acceptable outcome, but the reality is that you can't achieve that in the short term. So you can either a) label everyone who falls short a failure from the outset, or b) set realistic goals for different groups, allocate resources accordingly, and aim to reduce the gap every year until the passing rates for different groups converge to less than a single standard deviation. It doesn't matter whether you're looking at scores or passing rates. Your objective is year-on-year improvement. I think this is both more honest and more desirable than declaring educational institutions to be 'failing schools' and tarnishing the reputation of everyone who works or attends those schools.