While schools are spending much time and millions in tax dollars to help low-performing students meet the No Child Left Behind law’s mandates, many gifted and talented students are the ones being left behind.
Because there is little funding for special programs to support and encourage our brightest students, “these students lose interest in their passions, become frustrated and unmotivated from the lack of challenge their school curricula provides them,” according to an article by two Duke University education professors. Many gifted students drop out before graduating from high school because of this lack of academic challenge. “As a result, they become our lost talent,” the professors wrote.
Another misconception is that gifted and talented students are the children of privilege. “Giftedness” cannot be bought or learned; it is not determined by gender, religion, economics or skin color. It is just that — a gift. And what a waste of these gifts if we don’t put effort into helping gifted and talented students meet their potential.
Posted by Patrice Hein
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55 Comments
That was the complain my oldest had about school. There was no challenge to it and he would fall asleep in class. It may have not been an excuse because the teachers were telling me that he was getting straight A on tests. But could not get a passing grade because of daily work and falling asleep.
This is a sign of our skewed value system.
No wonder we are being passed up by Other industrial nations – we are putting more emphasis on the weak – than the strong.
Public schools are a mess, and there’s no feasible plan in sight to fix them. We’re too busy pampering the teachers. …sigh…
The NCLB measure is a waste of money and energy. There’s nothing wrong with helping those who have a tough time learning – but our focus should be on our future societal leaders – the great ‘minds.’
Just one more reason private schools and home schools out perform kids from the public school arena.
Just more feel-good, fluff legislation.
Yep………. those teachers are SO pampered!
Come on in to a real classroom GSheridan and see how “pampered” teachers are.
You’re just another anti-public education right-winger who thinks the “market” is the answer to everything. Public dollars to the private sector, NEVER?
Apop – as usual you’re barking up the wrong tree – I’ve worked in the classroom, in one of the highest-rated school districts in the State.
This isn’t about free market education – it’s about integrity.
We need to pay attention to all of the Bell curve; not just one end. Back when I was in school we had a variety of classes and levels available so that those who needed it a bit slower could thrive and those at the other end could be challenged. It worked well.
ben-Is the boycutt over?
Ben, I am STUNNED that you say we should pay attention to the Bell Curve.
I thought most liberals totally denounced that study.
Fleet – maybe the boycott is not ‘officially’ over, but most of the posters are back under other names.
That’s so funny.
No, we don’t. Maybe that is the problem; you do not know much about liberals. To some extent that may be our fault; we have allowed Rush to define us. Of course, I am not sure that I am truly a “liberal” anyway; the term is rather diffuse. For example, I tend to favor the death penalty, at least in some cases. (But, I want to be REAL sure of guilt)
fleettwood – I don’t really know. For some of us yes, for others … ?
Whatever the reason – I’m glad you’re back, Ben.
“Many gifted students drop out before graduating from high school because of this lack of academic challenge.”
I don’t know about you, but every high skool drop out I have met wouldn’t be described as “gifted”.I think big loser might come closer.
Forget high school. I was once the highest GPA holder at WSU CoE AE Dept until my senior year when I simply overloaded myself with too many projects. However, I slept through most of my engineering classes until then. Still, the faculty often passed me over for some other “squeaky wheels”.
I don’t have any statistics on this, but I have heard it said by several observers that schools tend to ignore the needs of gifted children because they tend to do reasonably well without special inputs.
In essence, give them a standard education, and they get “A’s” and “B’s”. Good enough. It is only if they become seriously disaffected, act out in class, or otherwise cause trouble that special resources can be directed to addressing their “problem behavior”.
This is folly. Money is wasted on mitigating “problem behavior” that would be better spent on preventing the behavior, i.e. purposefully challenging gifted kids with curricula designed for their talent levels, not for kids with 20-point-lower IQs. Moreover, addressing the “problem behavior” through “therapeutic intervention” doesn’t rectify the root cause of such behavior, so it is really money, time and resources flushed down the drain.
There are certain old prejudices in public education that are counterproductive. For example, suppose I suggest this:
Start teaching accelerated math to our top-2% gifted children in first grade. (In Wichita you would have 100 such students in each grade, or 1300 overall–not insignificant numbers.) Teach them how to master basic computation, including long division, by the end of third grade. Cover fractions, factoring and measurement in 4th and 5th grade. Teach them Algebra I in 6th grade, geometry in 7th, Alg II in 8th, pre-calculus in 9th, calculus in 10th…
The prejudices against this include cries of “elitism”, which are utterly misguided, because every society needs leaders, and in a science-and-technology-driven economy, this must include a highly math and science knowledgeable leadership component.
Another prejudice is, “Why accelerate anybody? It’s fine to let kids wait until 9th grade to take algebra, this is the way we’ve always done it.”
Due to the results of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study in the 80s, where American students fared poorly, an investigation of high-performing nations found that their schools were introducing algebra to 6th graders. So the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics adopted a new standard that included largescale implementation of Algebra I as an 8th grade course.
This has worked in some places, but not Kansas. KBOR last year disqualified middle-school Algebra I as a Qualifed Admissions core-curriculum course.
The idea of teaching algebra in middle school is good, but its execution in Kansas has failed. Why? For one thing, middle school teachers with elementary-education majors are assigned algebra-teaching duties. The state did implement a Secondary Mathematics Major program for teachers grades 6-12, a smart step, but it hasn’t generated enough mathematics-knowledgeable middle-school teachers, so the elementary-ed-major teachers have been allowed to keep teaching Algebra I to the best of their inadequate ability, and as a result, middle school “Algebra I” students haven’t been learning Algebra I.
So the entire course, statewide, has been disqualified, because KBOR does not feel it should be the Regents Universities job to teach reasonably bright students remedial algebra, given the fact that this job is heavily funded at the secondary level. College algebra was originally designed for freshmen who barely passed, or failed high school algebra, not for kids who received “B”s and “B+”s in the subject.
I personally know of a student who received “good” grades up through Algebra II, but when he was given a math-placement exam during his first week at university, it was determined that he needed to take college algebra. (The use of placement exams has become standard, in response to the unreliability of secondary-school grades as an evaluation metric—a phenomenon that did not exist 30 years ago—and also inadequacies of knowledge-assimilation measurement in the ACT and SAT.) Then he was unable to pass the college algebra course on his first attempt. Basically, he didn’t have the requisite study skills. But he started acquiring them and got a handle on the material.
His university-educated parents (father holding a math degree, mother an elementary-ed degree) could have provided special help to him, and would have, had their son received “D”s in Alg I, Geometry and Alg II, but he was getting “B”s, so they concluded he was learning math reasonably well–they were given no reason to suspect that special intervention was necessary.
The parents were lulled into complacency by a school system that was egregiously mischaracterizing their child’s math knowledge-acquisition.
This student, of note, is bright and outgoing. He’s going to get through university, without doubt.
But in secondary school, he decided to follow a course of getting “good enough” grades, cramming for exams, doing math problems mentally without writing down his work, all of which behaviors were encouraged by the system through various improprieties, including his teachers’ failure to dock him points for correct answers on homework and tests without substantive work being shown, and the awful phenomenon of grade hyperinflation.
If our public schools are going to begin teaching math correctly, including reforming middle school Alg I to make it a college-track-creditable course, and evaluating students’ performances in a professional manner, something has to change.
Yet another problem with NCLB; the effort to “bring up” the lower end, to the exclusion of all else.
GS; the fact is that private schools and home schooling (if the student fits) are allowed to pick and choose; there’s not a lot, if any, of the lower two quartiles in achievement ability in the typical private school, what with the admissions testing, etc. As to home schooling; if that’s the choice of the parents, so be it; I am aware, however, of some situations where “home schooling” is an out for parents who don’t want to be bothered with the nuisances of attendance, etc., and the run ins with the Juvenile authorities over tardiness, truancy.
As I have oft posted, each student is entitled to the level of education which will allow him/her to achieve a maximum of the academic potential possessed by the individual; sadly, the “gifted” ones seem to receive the short end of the stick in many schools. I do not blame teachers for this, nor the administration, in most cases; when a federal law is sitting on top of everything, demanding AYP, etc., it is a natural tendency to devote the time and resources to those situations where the measurement is concentrated, that is, the “lower end” of the spectrum.
Fleettwood; while I’m sure you would label the very bright drop outs I have met (a small number, to be sure) “losers”, there is at least a small dose of reality of the observation concerning the lack of academic challenge for those individuals.
“…there is at least a small dose of reality of the observation concerning the lack of academic challenge for those individuals.”
So small as to be unworthy of discussion.
Teachers are so overwhelmed with all the mandated tests they don’t have time to do the job they want to do. I only wish my CDs and other accounts grew/compounded at the rate the mandated testing does. Anyone who hasn’t been teaching in the last 10 years is totally out of the loop. I’ve also found that the truly gifted students have found something of special interest in every lesson, something totally unnoticed by the average student.
What’s funny about all this is that every post makes it sound like THEIR child is a better student than those left behind. Come on, folks! Are you telling me that your kid is one of those gifted? Another thing, public schools are NOT in a mess as some of you claim. To me it’s the PARENTS who are the mess. How many of you who are parents take time off from work to volunteer as hosts for field trips, class projects that call for adults as supervisors etc. I’ll wager not many. Every parent likes to think their child is brainy above all other kids. The point is there are a few gifted children in public schools. Most adults wouldn’t know who is gifted and who’s not. Just because ‘Billy’ or ‘Annie’ can count to 25 at three years of age doesn’t mean he and or she is gifted. Another thing! All this talk about private schools and home schooling making better students may be true up to a point. I, personally have seen home school kids who don’t have a clue what they want to do after leaving the nest. To me, home schooling only keeps that child from being personally involved in the real world. My daughter was a roomate of a home schooled/privately educated child. She was so screwed up at KU that she became anorexic. So much so she had to be treated for the disease. My daughter stuck by her side through all this….a public educated kid standing by the side of a home schooled/privately educated girl who was supposed to be a better student. All because of this nonsense pitting public schools against home schools and private schools. People it’s all about the kids. It is time we get past this fruitless debate. The world is passing us by!!!!
Oh, I thought the topic would be on incandescent bulbs versus mercury vapor bulbs…
Two out of eighteen comments have come close to what the gifted is all about.Do not worry about the “gifted”, as long as you do not put social and peer pressure on them and bum them out, they can take care of themselves.
Vaughn, while I agree that “each student is entitled to the level of education which will allow him/her to achieve a maximum of the academic potential possessed by the individual,” I can’t say I’ve ever seen that happen in a public school setting.
Not for either end of the intelligence spectrum. Although, I WILL say that my son, who was in the top 1/2 of 1% of the nation (intellectually,) was given a LOT of help, and when he graduated younger than most – he already had quite a few college credits under his belt. But for the typical “A” student, that isn’t usually an option.
Homeschool rules don’t necessarily have to follow general attendance guidelines as put for for public schools. Parents can hold school at night, and on weekends, if they choose.
If I am correct, and I may well be wrong – you may have a brother that sits on the school board of one of KS highest-rated public schools. If so – he’s a friend, but he’s getting ready to face a miffed-off group that was just turned down for their donations of positive books to the school libraries – Helen Keller, and Rosa Clark biographies, included.
The school’s librarians decided they didn’t want the stinkin’ books – because, of all things, they were being donated by a group they didn’t care for. But the books are brand new – mostly hardback.
That’s a specific incident – but it serves to illustrate my point. The folks who work in the schools have become exclusionary to the point where the STUDENT pays for their political agenda. That’s just crap.
In private settings, the parents, who hold the pursestrings have MUCH more say. And parents MUST be involved for a child to reach his/her educational potential.
Homeschool is the same way. It’s exclusionary ONLY in the aspect that it is specific to the children of said parent.
The bottom line is – if we want the best for EACH child – we MUST sidestep the current public system.
It’s broken – and sending our children there out of political support for the system isn’t doing them any favors.
It’s just being hardheaded.
IMHO.
As usual, apophis sounds off with tripe such as, “You’re just another anti-public education right-winger who thinks the “market” is the answer to everything. Public dollars to the private sector, NEVER?”
Public dollars are going to the private sector as I write this. You may not agree, but it is needed and, if well thought out, could raise the bar for public education to follow. But with the likes of apophis and his ilk calling anybody disagreeing with them, I expect that will be difficult to do.
I consider myself progressive in thought and politics. What I DON”T consider myself is a fan of the apophis line of reasoning, which seems to follow a path intended to force their nineteenth century rose colored glasses opinions on everybody as the end-all way to education.
Sorry, apophis, you just ain’t that smart.
GS: my brother does not discuss Board business with me, nor do I ask about it unless it (my question) has to do with what is in the public arena, which is always after the fact. I have no idea of the controversy to which you allude.
I agree with your general thought that parental involvement is necessary; however, I don’t see us as a society giving up public education any time soon. Thus, my efforts, as minimal as the same are, go to improvement thereof. I also offer my thoughts to a certain private institution here in Wichita with which I am associated in an informal (now) way; btw, both our daughters attended this institution for a part of their education, to their admitted benefit.
Congratulations on the achievements of your son; I have one daughter similarly situated, and one that was “almost” there. In our case, Northeast Magnet here in Wichita was the best choice for them (made by each of them), replete with numerous college credits upon high school graduation for both; that doesn’t make it the best choice for anyone else.
I understand that perforce homeschooling is exclusionary; would that this principle be recognized in extracurricular activities as well. This likely doesn’t sound too good, but it seems to me that each “home school” should be limited to the child(ren) of the parent(s) so choosing this method of education; and, as such, participation in KSHSAA, e.g., extracurricular events should be limited on a “school by school” basis.
GSheridan,
I agree with you to a point. I home-schooled two kids. This enabled them to progress at individualized paces. We could have sent them to a New England boarding school. But we relished their company.
Vaughn’s spouse works in a private school. Her employment qualified the Tolles’ daughters for tuition discounts. But the Tolles chose a public high school, and it worked for their girls.
In some states, the schools are required to allow primarily home-schooled students to selectively enroll in classes such as foreign language and lab-science that cannot be taught at home. Also home-schooled kids are allowed to participate in band/orchestra and athletics at nearby schools. This is smart policy.
Public education is the only choice for most people. It is going to educate, either well, mediocrely or poorly, 80%+ of young Americans.
So, ultimately, we have to ask, “How can we transform it from an Industrial Age invention to a Postindustrial Age invention?” How can a system, originally designed to ensure that 80% of its “output” was semiliterate and seminumerate, and thus forced to work in industrial-economy manual-labor occupations, be transformed to make 80% of its output literate and numerate?
If some people say, “That’s impossible,” it only means it is impossible within the constraints of an obsolete education system. It may be impossible with ANY education system, but we can’t know this to be fact, because we haven’t tried alternatives for a long enough period to test good ideas and bad ideas, sort them out and measure the outputs of good ideas.
Apophis rejects charter schools. But these are experimental seedbeds in the public arena. In times of enormous change, when a model designed for a past economy don’t work in a new, emerging economy, you need to do experiments. You need experiments that are freed from traditional constraints that are able to ask, “If we do this and that, which regular schools are prohibited from doing, what happens?”
As a gifted student who attends Derby middle school,i believe they hit it right on the nail. NO child left behind is bull. i attended wichita independent from k-5 and there was no child left behind. they teach to the upper students and the others have to rise to the occasion. If not U FAIL
How are we supposed to close the achievement gap if we don’t slow down the smart ones?
Well, Fleet, it shouldn’t be done by pulling the top back to the middle.
vt-Isn’t that what the argument is regarding people with high incomes? Isn’t that what the “wage gap” is about?
Vaughn, your brother is a good man; my husband and I have known him, his wife, and their children for many years. All good, salt-of-the-earth, folks. The board is lucky to have him, but there are other members that are not so wise. He wouldn’t allude to the situation I mentioned – it hasn’t reached his ears…yet.
I agree not every child can take a caseload as our children did – and not swamp, and I would like to see more opportunity for the ’smart’ kids, not just the ‘big brains.’
I would actually like to see more homeschooling cooperatives. If parents could legally pool their resources they could share instructional time with other kids. I had to learn Calculus as I instructed it. We did well, but another math-structured soul might have done even better.
Our nation started with one-room schoolhouses, where children of all ages learned together, helping the little ones and taking responsibility as they went. Teachers were held to strict standards and the kids behaved….or left.
That’s what we need again today. In the interest of ‘fairness’ for every child, we built bigger and bigger schools, demanded the same curriculum for all, and slowed the progress of our elite minds at the same time.
My kids went to a magnet school for two short years here – but it was then dissolved, even though (or perhaps because,) their progress was on a higher level.
Public schools ARE fixable – but not under the current thought system.
Segregation, of sorts, will have to be implemented, based upon performance, if we are to bolster our brightest minds.
In one elementary school in my town, there is a larger proportion of non-English speaking students. When half of the class is comprised of these kids – kids who have less than a rudimentary smattering of English skills, how can she successfully teach math to the entire class? She can’t. She must either leave the lower half of the students behind – and concentrate on those who can understand her, or she must teach at a pace slow enough for the lower half to comprehend, hence the more advanced students will be bored, restless, and probably fidget – being then labeled as BD and attempts made to put them on Ritalin. When the children from this school enter Middle School, they are behind (on average) in comparison to the kids from the other elementary schools. The proof is in the pudding.
It’s a vicious circle.
Meanwhile, consider that educated, white citizens are having fewer and fewer children, while the birth rate of illegal aliens, and non-English speaking Americans is rising and we find we are beginning to have a MAJORITY in the classroom with learning problems, and the advanced students are left to their own devises.
Not all smart students will be bolstered as your daughter and my son were – most may not score quite as high, and therefore not qualify for special treatment. But those ‘left behind’ kids are the future of our country.
We are placing our highest educational value on the students least likely to succeed, and it is showing more and more everyday in our test scores, competitions, and technology.
It’s time for a change.
A big change.
Sorry, apophis, you just ain’t that smart.
Posted by: J M Walker | March 26, 2007 at 12:04 PMThat is a REAL intelligent statement!
How did that anti-arena “rally” go for you? I think you should have gone with David Clark’s “Nu-way” suggestion on the arena thread.
You people can whine all you want, it isn’t going to change the way we do business in education.
Once again everyone knows what is wrong with education. Of course in the Republican hole called Kansas no one would be willing to admit that NCLB was a loser idea from an uninformed president. He was not educated in the public school system. What is his excuse for his stupidity?
Most truly gifted students are not behavior problems and are rarely bored. These students are busy reading, working on problem solving, etc. They ask questions when necessary and spend the rest of the day learning through self-directed projects. The problem children are those who hear constantly from their self important parents that they are very smart and it must be a problem with the teacher and education in general when they do poorly. It couldn’t possibly be that they sleep during class, play around, don’t do homework, and spend all night going to extracurricular activities.
These same self-indulgent parents want to drain more money off of education for the masses and send their little genius to a private school so they can brag about it to friends and co-workers. It’s not really about what would be best for the child. Wanting the best education for all children does not make one a liberal, it makes a person a responsible, caring adult.
I think it was VT above who said that we should strive to give each kid the best education that he can take advantage of. I agree, and this fits well with my ‘bell curve’ comment above.
We need scientists and engineers, doctors, qualified managers. We also need technicians, line workser, machinists, etc. I remember counseling a student at WSU who was finding that he simply didn’t belong there. He ended up transferring to Vo-Tech (that was before they screwed that up) and loved it. My joke to him was to bet that within 5 years he will be making more money than me! His hands will be dirty but so what?
My focus in education has been post-secondary; however my philosophy fits in ‘regular’ school too. Like I said, we had that back in Georgia back in the ‘dark ages’ and it worked. in fact, my only complaint is that I wish I had taken at least some ’shop’ so I would know how to operate a home!
Rosa Clark biography???
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Rosa+Clark+biography&btnG=Search
“You people can whine all you want, it isn’t going to change the way we do business in education.”
Systems, languages, blog sites, you name it, that do not change, die.
I always get a chuckle from people stating that ‘public dollars should not go to private education’. The funny thing is, where did the ‘public money’ come from? Straight from the private sector.
Many people forget the reality of the public education system. It’s a government bureaucracy. Hence the usual forces in the service industry do not apply. A system that can be unresponsive and sub-standard because nobody would dare cut funding for the all important education system.
We can talk all day long about great ideas for improving education. Every education thread here people are coming up with great ideas to change the schools for the better. However it takes an act of Congress to make any real changes to the government education system.
We need to approach education with a business mindset.Obviously there need to be some fresh ideas about how best to educate the youth of our state.I would love to see some concerned business folk on the State BOE in addition to education professionals.
Good point brian. We need to know what the jobs of tomorrow might be and what skills will be needed.
Here is an idea, how about performance based progression in public schools.
First we must identify what we expect students to know before the progress from one class to another. We then pay teachers to teach a specific class with specific learning objectives.Students would all start out at the same level. They would move to the next class after they mastered the concepts in the first. If they did not learn what they should have the first time, they will take it again. Then again and again. After a certain number of tries, each with a different teacher, they would be evaluated for a different educational track.
This solves several problems. Teachers would not be fighting as many different performance levels in one class. Gifted students could move to the next level when they are ready. Lower performers would be in a class geared towards teaching what they need to learn.
I would anticipate that the bell curve would apply, and for most students this scenario would look no different than it does for the majority of students today.
Probably the biggest hurdle to this would be the responsibility it places on students and parents. If a parent wants their kid to progress with the rest of the class they will provide the tools necessary for them to do so. There would be no other students to blame for lack of performance because everyone would be at the same level. The teachers could not be blamed (as easily) because the students would have the opportunity to learn the same material from other teachers.
This is a little outside the box, so I am interested in feedback.
Interesting idea but I think unworkable. Problem is that you need groups progressing together since the teachers must be able to work with a group. I think that is one reason it worked where I went to school. We were big enough (graduating class 500+) to have enough at each level to constitute a ‘cohort’. that system with ‘tracking’ seemed to work.
Sometimes I think we try to reinvent the wheel. This was in the 50s-60s and I took calculus, 2 years chemistry, physics, biology, Spanish, etc. Still had time for band and a hell of a lot of football games (missed only one in five years – for my stupid sister’s wedding) and all the partying that went with them.
The bottom line is the Teachers Union got owned by NCLB and are whining about meeting standards.
The Teachers Union don’t like being told what to do. It must be painful when the Government asks them to be more like teachers than Union Activists.
Squeal and Whine, let’s hear more from them. :)
Flatus sounds and smells in your general direction, Mr. RepubliKKKahn!
From: A secret admirer
Republican, I don’t think it is the Unions being whiners complaining about NCLB but rather about the unreasonableness of NCLB.
Is it reasonable that ALL students should have to pass performance tests? Is it reasonable that if mentally handicapped and challenged students cannot pass the same tests are normal abilitied students teachers will be held accountable?
brian,
The challenged students or I think it’s called persistent disabilities categories is addressed by the NCLB act. There are allowances that can be made by the State’s and Local Boards of Education to modify standards.
http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/guid/raising/alt-assess-long.html
GSheridan,
“one of the highest rated schools in the state”? Then you must be educated enough to realize that SES is a major contributing factor to a child’s educational performance. Those from low SES backgrounds have a greater challenge because they lack the “cultural capital” their higher SES peers have.
Also, one of the reasons private and home school students are more successful is because their parents VALUE education. Plus, those schools oftentimes have “selective” enrollment.
Shame on you for skewing the facts. You should know better.
Apophis is in an untenable position. As his friend Richard Mousley told the Eagle’s Roy Wenzl (Mousley had a picture of “The Flying Spaghetti Monster” on his classroom door, which offended former BOE member Connie Morris), there has been a substantial drop in middle-school students’ math skills since he started teaching a quarter-century ago.
Mousley, a highly respected local science teacher, is unable to teach science well, because his students don’t know math. Trying to teach science without students’ knowing math is kind of like trying to drive a car uphill–after removing the tires and wheels. That’s a futile proposition.
Mousley is stymied. As a union leader, he needs to cultivate teachers’ support. But this means, for example, protecting the jobs of elementary-ed-trained teachers who have been assigned pre-algebra and algebra who don’t understand the subjects.
You can’t create better middle-school science education while undermining middle-school math education. This is a science-education-failure strategem. The elementary-ed-major teachers never anticipated teaching pre-algebra and algebra when they decided to become teachers as adolescents, they were not selected when they were earning their degrees for these jobs. They were offered the jobs afterwards, even though they were unqualified for them.
Today, in middle age they may think they can do the jobs, but they’re mistaken. That’s why KBOR had to disqualify middle-school Algebra I. Giving “D”-performing students “Bs” in math masks the teachers’ deficiencies until their brighter kids go to university, take placement exams, and are revealed to not have a “B” (good) knowledge level of algebra, but a “D” or “F” (very deficient) knowledge level. The kids didn’t issue “Bs” to themselves.
Republican,
The “allowances” you mention regarding Special Needs students and NCLB is only the tip of the iceberg.
There are limitations on what percent can pass certain types of tests: 1% Alternate and 2% KAMM (Kansas Assessment of Multiple Measures), which is NOT a “modified” test – it’s AT GRADE LEVEL.
The general population is an estimate 10-12% special needs. And schools can only have 3% pass the aforementioned tests. That means that 7-9% of the special needs students must take the General Assessment. If more than the 3% taking the “other” tests pass, then anyone over that is automatically classified as NOT PASSING, even if they did.
Yeah, that seems fair … doesn’t it? No wonder there’s such an uproar.
Common Sense,
As you mentioned there are limitations. Limitations also includes the potential of a student in specialized categories of Special Needs.
Obviously, one cannot lump in dysfunctional students that cannot speak or in a progressive way communicate under examination procedures; no one expects them to do so.
I’ve mentioned before on this Blog , that I have a cousin who has Down’s Syndrome. He’s is older and still attends a school to further his education. Younger Down’s Syndrome student won’t be categorized into the Test Assessment categories that you refer to. I think you have misinterpreted the situation with some disingenuous statistics.
Take another look of how special needs students are categorized and you will find your answer.
Republican,
I respectfully disagree – I deal with these stats on a daily basis and am extremely knowledgeable of the criteria and nuances of AYP … The data I shared is correct.
Common Sense,
It sounds as if there is a confusion with compliance and placement assessment. If one through standard evaluation practices artificially introduces a child at a higher level through placement assessment techniques and then the child fails to maintain levels prescribed as successful, then a re-evaluation is necessary.
If one poorly applies the supposition of standard to categorized children, then the fault is at the evaluation process and not with the standardized tests and NCLB standards.
I don’t think NCLB and AYP are a very good idea.
Arthur Kaplan first demonstrated that multiple choice testing has inherent flaws that could be “gamed”. Today, his company, as well as Princeton Review, and myriad local test-prep organizations train college-bound kids how to raise SAT score averages by 100 points, and ACT score averages by 3 points in 40-hour intensive coaching sessions.
The tests are, theoretically, designed to assess students’ knowledge by presenting “sampling” questions of knowledge of broad spectrum. But you can beat the tests by focusing on what is sampled. Plus, teaching various tricks, such as substituting simple real numbers, like -1, 0, and 1 to “solve” algebraic problems without actually knowing algebraic methods, as well as stratagems for eliminating obviously wrong answers, and using guessing among remaining choices, even if you don’t know the actual answers.
Test-makers can also game tests to raise scores. For example, consider two questions:
The fourth American president who was a principal author of the U.S. Constitution was: A. John Adams, B. James Monroe, D. James Madison. D. Thomas Jefferson
But now, change the answer choices to:
A. George Washington, B. Andrew Jackson, C. James Madison, D. Benjamin Franklin.
Now change the answer choices to:
A. Franklin D. Roosevelt, B. John F. Kennedy,C. James Madison, D. Ronald Reagan.
The questions all have the same correct answer, but they test quite different levels of knowledge. But even in the first case, out of every 1000 totally-clueless students, 250 or so can get the correct answer by sheer blind-guess luck.
You can give a geometry problem in which a circle is shown with a given diameter of 4. What is the approximate area of the circle, rounded to a whole number?
To get this problem right by mathematical knowledge, a student has to recall that area of a circle = pi x r^2. So the first step is to halve the diameter. Then square this, and multiply by 3.14.
A. 4 B. 8 C. 13 D. 16
But again, out of 1000 totally-clueless students about 250 will get it right by pure luck.
Now instead give the following, with the same answer choices: “A circle of diameter 4 is inscribed in a square,” and present a figure showing the circle touching each side of the square. If a student can recall that the area of a square is side length x side length, figuring its area to be 16 is simple. The circle visually appears to have a bit smaller area than the square. So the only visually sensible choice is C: you don’t have to be able to recall the area formula for a circle.
For the above questions, a free-response format (write your own answer) requires substantive knowledge to derive a correct answer. In this format, it is impossible to get a correct answer by blind luck, or by whittling away unreasonable answer choices. Multiple-choice testing for evaluating schools and students is a dunderhead notion.
heart, you and I are in total agreement on the use of mulitple choice questions as the evaluative tool for schools and students. No question about it, there.
The test taking skills taught by the Princeton Review, Kaplan, et al should be readily ascertainable by reasonably bright folks just paying attention. Similarly, a crude way to approach the ACT is “letter of the day”, as the ACT does not deduct for wrong answers.
I no longer have any familiarity with the State Assessments given in Kansas, which are used for AYP and NCLB purposes. In their origins, years before NCLB, the High School Math Assessment had a few of the free-form questions of the type you describe; it is my understanding these have been dropped from the newer versions, due to the time pressure for results, inter alia. Perhaps someone out there can correct me if my recollection is wrong.
However, the question remains; how to provide third-party accountability for education. I have become convinced that one cannot solely rely upon grades awarded by the teachers; there seems to be a form of “grade inflation” present at all levels of education. While the use of fixed per centages would seem to be of benefit, these outcomes can be massaged by the way questions are framed. Perhaps a “normal” distribution really isn’t best; a Poisson distribution, perhaps? I have nothing constructive to say further on this, and will cease for now.
Vaughn,
A Poisson distribution measures relatively rare events. A normal distribution is appropriate for mass testing.
Public education is all over the map. The Davidson Academy in Reno has been created with private start-up money, but it’s a public school for students with stellar academic talent.
Evanston Township High in Illinois is located near Northwestern University. The school is an Ivy League “feeder”. They not only have a AP courses, they have Ph.D.s teaching some of them.
The several 11th-12th-grade public residential math-and-science academies, including those in our next-door neighbor states Oklahoma and Missouri recruit many of the best and brightest, but not all, because options for some students include local public high schools with large-palette AP courses, and second-year university courses, as your daughters took.
In Overland Park, half the parents have bachelor’s degrees and one out of five have advanced degrees. Mothers aren’t in their early 20’s when their first children start school, they’re in their early-to-late 30’s. Professional parents express demands, and get solid AP programs.
Wichita is a blue-collar manufacturing town with a blue-collar mentality. Which is too bad, because blue-collar manufacturing jobs are blowing away to Asia like Dust Bowl dirt.
There are always going to be a lot of kids who are going to be left behind. It’s substantially a race issue, yes, but it’s also a “Where do you live?” issue. At Evanston Township, there are black students who are outperforming most Wichita white students.
In San Jose, California a poll was conducted asking mostly Latino students what they wanted. They responded, “higher challenges”. They wanted to be required to work harder.
In wichitavoice.com, you mentioned “interdisciplinary programs centered around Biology are the place to be”. I agree. I studied the most-advanced bio available in my era, biochemistry and molecular biology.
But today, in Kansas, the secondary grades 6-12 biology major program allows future biology teachers to take physics for humanities students as their only physics course–i.e. physics for non-science-knowledgeable people–and to take only freshman chemistry, which doesn’t teach students anything about biomolecules, something that requires taking organic chemistry. This is emblematic of abysmal anti-science prejudice in our state’s K-12 education system.
Remember the flap at Piper High a few years ago about 9th grade biology students cribbing info from the Internet? Not reported was the fact that this high school class’s leaf-collection and tree-shrub-identification exercise was a 6th-grade general science assignment (at least where I grew up). The teacher, Christine Pelton decided she didn’t need the heat, so she said at the time she was quitting to open a pre-school.
Republican,
The assessments I mentioned are not for “placement” – they are state assessments that are available to SPED students – IF they qualify and the qualification criteria is stringent. I’d rather have a SPED student “not meet standards” by taking the APPROPRIATE assessment rather than “meeting standards” taking an “easier” assessment they should not qualify for. It boils down to integrity (and risking an audit by the state).
That said, even “playing by the rules” there are still numerous unjust practices NCLB causes in both the SPED and ELL populations. If people were much more knowledgeable of the nuances of how AYP is determined, many would change their position … unfortunately, educating the NCLB illiterate is fruitless – most prefer to have any opinion rather than an informed one. I’m not complaining – just stating the facts.
I have to say the problem is not the lack of money nor is it standardized tests. The problem is parents lacking in the give a crap category.
Most parents are so uninvolved in their children’s educations that the public school system is failing to provide more than a substandard education to “our” best and brightest.
The parents view the public school system as a taxpayer supported daycare.
I was lucky to have parents who would not allow my school to let me just linger and get by doing only what could get me the grades needed to graduate. They constantly challenged me to exceed the goals set by my peers, my teachers, and myself.
An example was during my senior year of high school, after completing Algebra I, II, & Trig,I was intially allowed to take Consumer Problems. This class taught you how to balance a checkbook and do remidial budgeting.
My parents decided to have me take PreCalc instead.
I will take care of my childrens education and let them manage the lazy parents’ children.
Nods at Common Sense…
With that I leave you with a quote…
“Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?”George W Bush
Bleeding Heart Liberal,
Kudos to your parents. They knew what was best for you. They were effective advocates. They didn’t let you slack off, or the school system channel you into slackerdom.
But let’s be a little more analytical about a lot of parents.
Superintendents, assistant superintendents, building principals and assistant principals have the “juice” (clout) to get their children placed in any class they choose. They don’t have to fight, they just say, “I want Amy to be in Ms. Rogers’ class next year,” and voila! it’s done. Do you agree?
Teachers have second-highest clout. They’re members of the “club”. Right?
Prominent citizens, and scions of prominent “founding families” are accommodated. If your grandfather founded the town’s largest, or only bank, if you’re a doctor who provides medical care to school authorities and their children, your kids get into whatever classes you pick for them.
But to call parents who don’t exert their voices AWOL is not necessarily true. A lot of parents felt intimidated during their own school years. Some still feel intimidated dealing with school authorities.
Moreover, some parents who are NOT AWOL, but don’t have “the juice” TRY to get their children placed in appropriate classes, are rebuffed, because their status is not “recognized”. My sister, a registered nurse, did her homework and found out who the best teachers were in her children’s school. She tried to get her children into these teachers’ classes, but was totally rebuffed. She didn’t have the juice. Never mind that she was doing noble work for the members of the community. If she were one of the doctors for whom she worked, it would have been a totally different story.
My wife and I tried to correctly get our first son placed in a local school’s gifted first grade class. Why do I say correctly? Because his reading level was 3rd grade–he was starting to read Hardy Boys at age 6– he could do 2-digit addition and subtraction, he could identify all 50 states on a map with state names blocked out. He could write sentences with 2-3 syllable words in neat block-letters.
This was due to his having attended a private Montessori pre-school and kindergarten for 3 years in one of America’s most affluent and well-educated communities. The Montessori school was located a mile and a half from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the Scripps Clinic and Research Institute, the Salk Institute and the University of California, San Diego. The town of La Jolla had more Nobel Laureates per capita population than any community in America (approximately 1.2 per 10,000 residents).
We moved to the mid-continent. My wife tried to get our son enrolled in a close-to-Tulsa school’s gifted 1st grade class 4 weeks before school started, but we didn’t have the juice, because we were only medical trainees, not established doctors. My wife was told that the gifted class had been filled the previous spring, and absolutely no space was available. Not negotiable.
Our son was placed in “the next best class” and his mind and spirit were severly abused. For example one of his first assignments was a handout with a mixture of a dozen squares, circles and triangles–”Color the squares red, the circles blue and the triangles yellow kids.” I remember that particular assignment, because he brought the paper home, with a gold-star stuck on, and with tears in his eyes, he told us, “I don’t want to go to this school.”
We later learned that a couple newly-recruited professors got their kids into gifted classes in the same school. Applied at the same time we did.
Anyway, we applied to Tulsa’s top private school, Holland Hall. It was intellectually selective, for people who were not prominent in the community. We were required to let them use an educational psychologist to evaluate our son who spent 2 hours testing him, and the school charged us $200 for this. He judged that our son had a 135 IQ, which meant he would be in the top 5% of the class in ability, so they welcomed our son and our $7000 tuition check. Which was a lot of money for us, because our combined two-physicians-in-training income was about $50,000. (These figures are in today’s dollars.)
So it really doesn’t boil down to some parents being committed to their children, others being negligent. That’s a far too simplistic claim, BHL. It does often boil down to parents’ status in the community, as to whether or not they have “the juice” necessary to be recognized by school authorities as “meriting” accommodation. In the case I mentioned, our son would have been one of the top-five performers in a 22-student gifted class. So much for public-education meritocracy.
To put things into context, Vaugh Tolle imbedded himself into the high school his daughters attended. He was in his mid-to-late 40’s. But he and his spouse started out, when they were younger and didn’t have middle-age”respectability”, in a private school.
We couldn’t imbed ourselves into the school system in the Jenks, Oklahoma district in our late 20’s, and parlay this into effective advocacy, not because we didn’t want to, but when you’re working 100 hours a week, providing life-saving services to the community, you don’t have time to do what people who have 40-50 hour per week jobs do. You don’t have late afternoons and evenings off to attend PTA and school advisory board meetings. It’s not that you don’t want to, it’s just that you don’t have that opportunity.
Wichita has a lot of smart engineers and doctors, recruited from other places, who don’t have juice to get their kids correctly placed. So they send their kids to Wichita private schools. Are they trying to destroy public education? No, they feel that public education here would hamstring their kids.
It’s not that they want to spend several thousand dollars a year, above and beyond their taxes, to educate their children. It’s just that the public education system isn’t interested in providing challenging coursework for kids who deserve it.
Wichita’s top public college preparatory program is East High’s IB program. Kids can take up to 3 college-creditable IB Higher Level courses. In Overland Park, Tulsa, and Oklahoma City today, very bright and hard-working kids can take 5 or 6 college-creditable AP courses and the very best, brightest and hard-working take 7 or 8 college-creditable AP courses. Wichita’s best and brightest students are being left behind other places’ best and brightest. Seven or eight college-creditable courses beats three. Take a baseball game, final score 8 to 3. Who wins the game?
We’re not talking Kansas v. New York. We’re talking about Wichita vs. Kansas and Oklahoma cities that are located only 160-170 miles from Wichita. Same zone. Wichita is the loser. Wichita’s best and brightest kids lose because their “coach” is ignorant and incompetent.
Exactly, heart, re: Poisson; that’s why I should have deleted that comment before hitting the Post button.
On AP courses; I’m given to understand that if one has a student at Northwest High School here in Wichita, there is a larger number of those opportunites available than in the other “comprehensive” high schools. A small comment; AP courses (and IB courses) are as good for college credit as they are accepted by the institution at which the student matriculates post-high school.