Siyamak sits down with Rex Ridgeway, President of PTA at Lincoln High School in San Francisco. Today he will explain how San Francisco inclusion policies are actually hurting the overall performance of students and why parents are leaving the public school system.
"Kids in San Francisco can't get to calculus. They moved Algebra1 out from the 8th grade in a city, which mayor London Breed has recently said is the hub of AI. In the heart of Silicon Valley you don't let kids shine." link
I'll be very interested to see how this turns out:
Artificial intelligence often induces fear, awe or some panicked combination of both for its impressive ability to generate unique human-like text in seconds. But its implications for cheating in the classroom — and its sometimes comically wrong answers to basic questions — have left some in academia discouraging its use in school or outright banning AI tools like ChatGPT.
That may be the wrong approach.
More than 8,000 teachers and students will test education nonprofit Khan Academy’s artificial intelligence tutor in the classroom this upcoming school year, toying with its interactive features and funneling feedback to Khan Academy if the AI botches an answer.
The chatbot, Khanmigo, offers individualized guidance to students on math, science and humanities problems; a debate tool with suggested topics like student debt cancellation and AI’s impact on the job market; and a writing tutor that helps the student craft a story, among other features...
Khanmigo is most commonly used for math tutoring, according to DiCerbo. Khanmigo shines best when coaching students on how to work through a problem, offering hints, encouragement and additional questions designed to help students think critically. But currently, its own struggles in performing calculations can sometimes hinder its attempts to help.
In the “Tutor me: Math and science” activity available to students, Khanmigo told me that my answer to 10,332 divided by 4 was incorrect three times before correcting me by sending me the same number.
In the same “Tutor me” activity, I asked Khanmigo to find the product of five numbers, some integers and some decimals: 97, 117, 0.564322338, 0.855640047, and 0.557680043.
As I did the final multiplication step, Khanmigo congratulated me for submitting the wrong answer. It wrote: “When you multiply 5479.94173 by 0.557680043, you get approximately 33.0663. Well done!”
The correct answer is about 3,056.
You might remember when I posted the results of my own playing with AI. That was several months ago and I was not impressed. AI looks like it might still have a ways to go, but I remain optimistic that it will improve.
These high schoolers don't know what a Minuteman is? That's kind of pathetic:
In 2021, the Mt. Diablo Unified School District Governing Board updated their mascot policy, requiring schools to choose non-human mascots in the case that the current one is deemed offensive or insensitive. The school board said that a student committee was formed last year at Concord High School and that students chose to replace the school's mascot, which depicts a Revolutionary War militia member holding a musket, with a bear...
Student trustee Susanna Barrios said that many students she talked to did not even know what a minuteman was and given that the school is majority Latino, did not feel represented by the mascot.
"I want to change the mascot to something that they have pride in and trust in," said Barrios.
I recommend the Marshmallow, as that's what between the ears of almost everyone in this story.
But not everyone:
"It’s disgusting to disrespect those who fought and sacrificed to defeat tyranny and ultimately found our great nation, and to add insult to injury, they’re replacing it with a meaningless and trite mascot that viciously murders small animals," reacted Matt Shupe, the Republican Party chairman of the Contra Costa County where the school is located.
I hope he's just jerking their chain with that last part, but this next part is true:
"These woke schools need to prioritize teaching math, reading, and writing to catch up from the educational losses during the pandemic rather than spitting on the memories of our veterans," he added.
Teachers working in California school districts with conservative school boards are increasingly finding themselves with a difficult decision: violate district policy and risk losing their job, or potentially disobey federal and state laws and policies and take a chance on ending up in court.
Last Monday was the first day of school at Chino Valley Unified campuses since the passage of a controversial board policy that would require teachers, counselors and administrators to notify parents if a child asks to be identified by a different gender or name, or to access a bathroom or take part in a program not aligned with the gender on their official records.
After the Chino Valley Unified decision, California Attorney General Rob Bonta warned the school district that the parental notification policy could violate the state’s anti-discrimination laws and students’ rights to privacy guaranteed under the U.S. and California constitutions, as well as federal Title IX protections and the state education code. Bonta launched a civil rights investigation into the school district last week...
(Local teachers union president) Walker sent a memo to teachers last week advising them to follow the district’s new policy but to object to it if they think the policy is improper or unlawful. If a teacher feels uncomfortable talking to a parent about a child’s gender identification, they should ask one of their administrators to take on that task, the memo directed.
“Members are expected to comply with directives given by their administrators, and if a member or the association find that there has been a violation of the collective bargaining agreement, then a grievance can be filed,” Walker said...
Guidance from the California Department of Education recommends that schools ask transgender students who, if anyone, they would like to be informed of their transgender status. The department says that rule should only be broken in rare circumstances when district officials feel there is a compelling need for parents to know the information and the student is given advance notice before parents are informed.
If you're keeping information from all parents because you think some might act in a way that you wouldn't agree with, well...
It shouldn't be a teacher's place to keep information from parents. What a horrible position to put teachers in.
"Chronic absenteeism" means a student has missed more than 10% of the school days in a year. This chart shows chronic absenteeism rates of several districts in the Sacramento area:
This data is a year old now. I'd love to know if there's been any "recovery" in the years since the 'rona, but still, it amazes me that in almost half of those districts, a full third of students are chronically absent.
Update, 8/16/23: It's not just the Sacramento area, or course:
Students across the U.S. have been chronically absent in record-high numbers after the COVID-19 pandemic, a new study from Stanford Research shows.
More than 25% of students were classified as chronically absent in the 2021-22 school year because they had missed at least 10% of the school year. Comparatively, before the pandemic, only 15% of students had such high levels of absenteeism, the study noted.
Is the veneer of civilization so thin that the school shutdowns of 2-3 years ago continue to wreak so much damage? It would seem so.
Every toilet but one was installed before the work crews left last night.
The parking lot expansion isn't done, but as lot of kids haven't gotten their licenses yet so early in the school year, it didn't affect us. It's supposed to be done next week.
We still don't have books. Well, we have books, but there stacked floor to ceiling in our book room until we get someone in there to put them into our system and check them out to students. Most of my classes' textbooks are available online after students complete a signup process, maybe I'll just start classes normally on Monday and just expect them to look up the books on the web site until we can get them issued.
My students who are dual-enrolled in a local community college class are largely clueless about what to do, they haven't heard from the college at all. Even our counselors can't get through to the dual-enrollment office at the college, it seems they're a little behind schedule in enrolling our students. Fortunately the college classes don't begin until a week from Monday, so there's still some time.
As is always the case on the first day of school, my students were friendly and respectful. I'll do my part to keep them that way as long as possible!
I warned all of them, though: do not mess with the freshmen. The freshmen are a protected class, I am looking out for them. After all, we have something in common--when they graduate, I graduate. Only 4 years left for me!
Today was the first day of school for students. Tomorrow is our first dance and first football game! Only supposed to get to the low 90s tomorrow, but into the 100s starting Monday. School should not start this early in August.
Students show up tomorrow.
Will the toilets be installed? Will the parking lot resurfacing be completed? When will we have a clerk to issue textbooks? (Our book room is currently floor to ceiling with boxes of new textbooks.)
Only The Shadow knows!
I was awake at 4am today and couldn't go back to sleep so I got to work extra early. I'm exhausted now, hopefully I'll get a good night's sleep in order to face the day on a most positive note.
Can you believe that I've already been back to work, and our students start on Thursday? It's so early!
It's already turning out to be an "interesting" start to the new year. Students haven't been able to pick up textbooks yet, and there are as yet no teacher books for some of our newly-adopted math books. By far the wildest challenge, though, is our lack of bathrooms. Specifically, toilets.
Last spring our school got all new matching furniture. Over the summer, among other projects, every classroom was to get carpeting, and other areas (staff lounges, cafeteria, restrooms) got new flooring. To put in new flooring, though, toilets had to be removed. As of today the vast majority of them had not been replaced--and as I said, almost 2000 students show up Thursday.
You can see why the sentiment "may you live in interesting times" was intended to be a curse.
They wouldn't have such gag clauses, and wouldn't sue people for violating such gag clauses, if they weren't trying to hide something:
The California Department of Education has threatened to sue two prominent Stanford University education professors to prevent them from testifying in a lawsuit against the department -- actions the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California calls an attempt to muzzle them.
The ACLU, in turn, is threatening a lawsuit of its own -- against CDE for infringing their and other researchers' First Amendment rights.
Observers say the dispute has the potential to limit who conducts education research in California and what they are able to study because CDE controls the sharing of data that is not available to the public.
At issue is a restriction that CDE requires researchers to sign as a condition for their gaining access to nonpublic K-12 data. The clause, which CDE is interpreting broadly, prohibits the researcher from participating in any litigation against the department, even in cases unrelated to the research they were doing through CDE.
"It keeps education researchers from weighing in on the side of parties who are adverse to the California Department of Education. So it's really skewing the information and expertise that can come into courts," said Alyssa Morones, an ACLU attorney involved with the case. "Individuals and students seeking to vindicate their rights no longer will have access to these education experts, and the court can no longer hear what they have to say"...
"What are state officials afraid of?" (Attorney) Jacobs said. "That their performance in running the school system during the pandemic in fact aggravated the achievement gap? That notwithstanding their protestations, they haven't done enough to address that problem?"
CDE declined to comment on the need for the litigation ban in data contracts or its threats and actions against Dee or Reardon. Researchers told EdSource they were unaware of similar prohibitions in other states, but EdSource could not verify that.
I have to believe that such a lawsuit against the CDE would be a slam dunk; at least, it would be in probably any other state.
You can poor millions into a school, provide all sorts of services, but if you're not changing what happens at home, it's probably for naught (with a few unique exceptions here and there around the country):
The inaugural class of third graders at the LeBron James-supported I Promise School in Akron will soon start eighth grade, and, for each of the last three school years, none of those students have scored “proficient” in Ohio’s math proficiency test.
That fact was alarming to some Akron Board of Education members who listened to an update during their meeting Monday on the school’s progress.
Meanwhile, the school — which, by design, only takes students who are two or more years behind grade level — was placed on a state academic watchlist for schools flagged for “Additional Targeted Support and Improvement (ATSI)." To be added to the watchlist, at least one of the schools' student subgroup’s performance must be in the lowest 5% of schools in the state. At I Promise, Black students and students with disabilities meet that criteria.
The school is 60% Black and 28% of the 554 students have disabilities.
No doubt they took some very difficult students, and on some measures the students have shown improvement:
Stephanie Davis, who became principal in June, struck a hopeful tone in a statement provided by the LeBron James Family Foundation. She pointed to students’ “i-Ready” scores, which show students’ mastery of topics separate from tests.
“Our students have not yet met the grade-level mastery mark but they are demonstrating growth based on (i-Ready) scores,” she said. “Of our incoming 8th graders, 32% met their annual typical growth in reading while 11% met their stretch goal for the year. Despite not mastering the grade-level standards, 42% of students demonstrated growth in i-Ready math across their 7th-grade school year.
“When working with students who are achieving below grade level, growth is as important as a measure of progress as proficiency. And the type of growth that is important to us is not made overnight," she concluded. "It takes time.”
Growth is good, but how much time do you need? And why did less than half grow sufficiently? Extra millions have been sunk into these students over the past 5 years without appropriate growth and achievement.
So who are the lefties gonna blame here? Racist teachers? Not enough money? Republicans? Not enough support? Read the article for how much extra support was provided by LeBron James and his foundation.
Here's how you know the school isn't going to improve much this year:
He added that next steps include more professional development and training for teachers, along with a deeper focus on analyzing data and what best teaching practices might be.
Absent evidence that the teachers absolutely suck, focusing on teachers as a whole is not going to give you any bang for the buck. Sure, get rid of those everyone knows suck, but then what? Until you can change what goes on at home, most of your efforts will fail. It's so obvious, but no one wants to admit it for two reasons:
Too many of those students are doomed to academic distress, and there's no political or social will to fix the problem. Sad.
Update: Remember what happened in Kansas City?
School reformers rejoiced when Federal District Judge Russell Clark took control of the district in ’85. He ruled it was unconstitutionally segregated, with dilapidated facilities and students who performed poorly.
To bring the district into compliance. the judge ordered it and the state over the next 12 years to spend nearly $2 billion to build more schools, renovate old ones, integrate classrooms and bring student test scores up to national norms.
But when the judge finally took himself off the case last year (1997), there was little to show academically for all that money. Although the district’s 37,000 mostly minority students enjoyed some of the best‐funded school facilities in the country, student performance hadn’t improved.
It was a major embarrassment and an ideological setback for backers of vastly increased funding for public schools...
For decades, critics of excess spending for public schools had said, “You can’t solve educational problems by throwing money at them.” To which educators and public school advocates replied, “No one’s ever tried.”
Kansas City settles the argument. Judge Clark invited the district to “dream.” Forget about cost, he said. He urged administrators to let their imaginations soar and assemble a list of everything they might possibly need to boost the achievement of inner‐city blacks. Using the extraordinary powers granted judges in desegregation cases, Clark said he would find a way to pay for it...
For more than a decade, the Kansas City district got more money per pupil than any other of the 280 major school districts in the country. Yet in spite of having perhaps the finest facilities of any school district its size in the country, nothing changed. Test scores stayed put, the three‐grade‐level achievement gap between blacks and whites did not change, and the dropout rate went up, not down...
Of course, the district’s biggest problems weren’t just administrative. The ideological biases of local educators, politicians and Judge Clark against accountability made them reject solutions that might have worked — merit pay for teachers, penalties for failure or vouchers for private schools.
Schools can only do so much in 6-7 hours a day; if what happens outside of school doesn't change, what happens inside of school won't change. Sure, there are Joe Clark and Jaime Escalante and Bob Moses superheroes, who can have an impact here and there, but if you expect every public school teacher to be a superhero, you're not being realistic about the problem or the solution. And you can continue to throw money at the schools--I love it when I get a pay raise--but if you think that by itself is going to improve student achievement, I will politely ask to see your supporting data.
Over at Joanne's blog are two posts about teaching math. First:
There's no evidence that "trauma-deformed pedagogy" (oops, "informed") helps students learn more, writes Max Eden, an American Enterprise Institute fellow, on Real Clear Education. Yet it's cited in support of California's controversial new math guidelines, which are full of dubious claims.
"Trauma informed" means educators take into account the fact that some students have led very difficult lives. But how does that affect teaching math...
The study includes no evidence students learned any math -- or that they "healed," writes Eden.
The examples cited would be a good social studies exercise, but they're crappy math. Let's continue:
Under the California framework, math teachers are supposed to train students to be change agents, writes Bill Evers of the Independent Institute. "The teacher is supposed to highlight 'connections' between math and 'environmental and social justice,'" perhaps by writing an “opinion piece” or “explanatory text.”
As the previous post explains, research shows that's not an effective way to teach math. We don't want kids to learn math, don't we?
If they can't give you good government, they'll give you "woke" government. If they can't give you good education, they'll give you "woke" education.
An excerpt from the second post:
"Students who spent more time in class solving practice problems on their own and taking quizzes and tests tended to have higher scores in math," the study found. In English, "teachers who allocated more class time to discussions and group work ended up with higher scorers in that subject."
Teachers in both subjects spent little time lecturing.
Lifting weights is how you get stronger. Writing is how you become a better writer. Speaking a language is how you become better at a foreign language. Playing an instrument is how you get better at playing an instrument. It's funny that only in math do we throw such principles out, and we do it in the name of a "social justice" that accomplishes exactly the opposite of what its proponents claim they want.
My school has hundreds upon hundreds of Chromebooks:
Thousands of Chromebooks used in schools are being sent to the recycling bin due to built-in software "death dates." These inexpensive computers, which became popular during the pandemic for digital learning, have a software expiration date set three to six years after their release.
Despite functioning hardware, expired Chromebooks no longer receive necessary software updates, rendering them useless for basic web browsing and applications. The California Public Interest Research Group reported that global Chromebook sales were nearly 300% higher in 2020 compared to the previous year. However, thousands of these laptops have already expired, with more reaching their death dates each year.
School districts are left with the burden of disposing of these devices and purchasing new ones. Google claims that the expiration dates are necessary because older devices cannot support the required software updates for security and stability. However, critics argue that the practice is wasteful and costly. CALPIRG estimates that doubling the life of Chromebooks sold in California in 2020 alone could save the state's schools $225 million.
Textbooks don't expire after 3 years.
Incidentally, I have a very old personal Windows laptop that I'd like to repurpose as a Chromebook; the hardware is fine but it's running on Windows Vista (!), and a new streamlined OS would make this laptop useful again. I looked into the Cloudready software but my generic laptop was not on the list of compatible devices. Chrome OS Flex needs more RAM than this laptop has, so this laptop will continue to sit in the closet until I can find a way to breath some life into it.
Update: I've tried Zorin OS, but despite my best efforts in the BIOS, I cannot get the laptop to boot from the flash drive that was created and from which I would install Zorin OS. Grrr.
I have a friend who seems to be the lone conservative voice on a school board. How easy it would be for the others to get rid of her if such a law were to go into effect:
A newly proposed measure facing the California Senate would bar school boards from adopting any policy that "contradicts any existing law requiring a school district to have inclusive policies, practices, and curriculum" and would allow for the removal of a school board member who either helps adopt such policies or who "prevents the governing board from conducting its business."
Under the measure, the governing board of a school district could censure or remove a member found to have violated one of these two rules by a two-thirds vote of the board in which the individual who is subject to the vote would not be allowed to vote in.
I have no doubt that disagreeing about any measure would be considered preventing "the governing board from conducting its business."
Assemblymember Bill Essayli, R–Woodcrest, who wrote AB 1314, the bill on which the Chino Valley policy was modeled and is hoping to replicate the Chino Valley policy across the state, said, "The board already cannot violate existing laws. This is an intimidation tactic to prevent board members from taking positions the opposition might attack as discriminatory."
Essayli, a former federal prosecutor, also noted the state Constitution already has a process for removing elected officials – the recall – and that the legislature cannot override the state constitution.
Under one-party rule here in the DPRK, no deviation from the approved orthodoxy is tolerated.
There's a definite leftward slant in this story, which isn't surprising since it comes from Oakland:
State Superintendent of Schools Tony Thurmond was told to leave a school district meeting in Southern California after expressing his opposition to a policy that requires administrators to inform parents if their child identifies as transgender.
Thurmond was escorted out of the meeting held by the Chino Valley Unified School District when he exceeded his allotted one-minute speaking time by a second or two.
He used his time to voice concerns about the policy, stating that it would violate the privacy rights of students.
The policy requires schools to notify parents in writing within three days after their child identifies as transgender, is involved in violence or talks about suicide. Schools must also now notify parents if their child seeks to change their name or pronouns or asks for access to gender-based sports, bathrooms or changing rooms that do not match their assigned gender at birth.
Despite Thurmond's objections, the Chino School Board ultimately voted to approve the policy, which mandates schools to notify parents if their child identifies as transgender, seeks a name or pronoun change, or requests access to gender-based facilities that do not correspond with their assigned gender at birth.
Thurmond's dramatic exit and the controversial vote come at a time when liberals and conservatives are vying for power – and how to shape young minds – at school districts throughout the state of California.
That's the rub right there. Conservatives aren't trying to use schools "to shape young minds", we expect parents to do that. Conservatives want to provide an education, not an indoctrination.
They're their parents' children, they're only our students.
Anyone who truly wants traditionally-underperforming students to succeed, and doesn't really want them to fail for their own political benefit, knows that the ideas contained in the new framework are a disaster, and it's not just those of us on the political right saying so:
Despite collapsing math scores, the California Board of Education voted to adopt a new "equity'" and "social justice" focused math education framework that education experts from across the political spectrum warn will increase achievement gaps and decrease learning among lower income and minority students.
Two out of three California students now fail to meet basic state math standards set in 2013. California spends over $20,000 per K-12 student, placing it among the top states for per-pupil spending even though its students rank 30th in math, according to national math SAT scores from the College Board.
Citing these differences, the framework focuses on three main changes to improve "equitable" math outcomes: "an assets-based approach to instruction; active student engagement through investigation and connection; and instruction that centers cultural and personal relevance, reflecting California's diverse students."
As I've stated before on this blog about so-called personal relevance:
According to one Kieran Egan, “Bertrand Russell, after his first disastrous experiment in organizing a school, observed that the first task of education is to destroy the tyranny of the local and immediate over the child’s imagination."
Russell is correct. The purpose of education is to get a child to see what's beyond his own nose.
But let's continue with the linked article:
Additionally, the framework concluded that "five important components of classroom instruction that can meet the needs of students who are diverse in so many ways: 1) plan teaching around big ideas; 2) use open, engaging tasks; 3) teach towards social justice; 4) invite student questions and conjectures; 5) prioritize reasoning and justification."
I'll be happy to "teach towards social justice", but I doubt what I teach would be what the framework's authors and promoters would want.
I'll be blunt. As Instapundit has said many times: If they can't give you good government, they'll give you "woke" government. I'll add to that: If they can't give you good education, they'll give you "woke" education. And that's exactly what California is dishing up here.
I know this seems shocking and unbelievable, but Kamala Harris is going to lie about Florida's academic standards in an effort to score some political points. No, she's not just operating under a different interpretation of those standards, she's going to lie, openly and brazenly:
NBC reports that Kamala Harris intends to visit Florida today to criticize its new school curriculum:
In remarks Thursday, Harris blasted efforts in some states to ban books and “push forward revisionist history.”
“Just yesterday in the state of Florida, they decided middle school students will be taught that enslaved people benefited from slavery,” she said at a convention for the traditionally Black sorority Delta Sigma Theta Inc. “They insult us in an attempt to gaslight us, and we will not stand for it.”
This is a brazen lie. It’s an astonishing lie. It’s an evil lie. It is so untrue — so deliberately and cynically misleading — that, in a sensible political culture, Harris would be obligated to issue an apology. Instead, NBC confirms that she will repeat the lie today during a speech in Jacksonville.
I have been trying to work out how best to illustrate the sheer scale of Harris’s falsehood, and I’ve come to the conclusion that the only way to achieve it is to list in one place all the relevant parts of the course about which she is complaining. So, below, I have copied and pasted every single reference to slavery, slaves, abolitionism, civil rights, and African Americans that is in the document. For those interested, the full curriculum (along with the curriculum for the teaching of the Holocaust) is here.
That list of references to "slavery, slaves, abolitionism, civil rights, and African Americans that is in the document" is long and extensive, and I encourage you to read it at the end of the linked article. The entire Florida document is linked in the above snippet.
As for the impetus for Harris' remarks, they seem to revolve around standard SS.68.AA.2.3:
Examine the various duties and trades performed by slaves (e.g., agricultural work, painting, carpentry, tailoring, domestic service, blacksmithing, transportation).
Benchmark Clarifications:
Clarification 1: Instruction includes how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.
Slaves were sometimes allowed to earn their own money and even buy their freedom. It's true, so why is that controversial? Answer: it's not. Harris' (and her compatriots') outrage is entirely ginned up, twisting the meaning of one sentence in the standards so as to score some political points.
If you have to lie to score political points, you're not doing a very good job.
Update, 7/24/23: It's not just me saying so:
Dr. William B. Allen , a longtime academic, former chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and a member of Florida’s African American History Standards Workgroup called claims made by Vice President Kamala Harris in highly-publicized remarks last week “categorically false"...
Asked how he would respond to critics of the new standards, Allen replied that “the only criticism I’ve encountered so far is a single one that was articulated by the vice president, and which was an error. As I stated in my response to the vice president, it was categorically false. It was never said that slavery was beneficial to Africans.”
Update #2, 8/1/23: Shocking, I know:
MAKING AN OFFER SHE CAN’T ACCEPT: DeSantis invites Kamala to meet as early as Wednesday unless she has “a trip to the southern border planned that day.”
“I am prepared to meet as early as Wednesday of this week, but of course want to be deferential to your busy schedule should you already have a trip to the southern border planned for that day,” DeSantis wrote in the letter. “Please let me know as soon as possible. What an example we could set for the nation – a serious conversation on the substance of an important issue! I hope you’re feeling up to it.”
Spoiler alert: She’s not.
UPDATE: Called it.
Of course she won’t debate or discuss the substance. The whole point of her attack is a drive-by political smear, not pursuit of historical fact or truth. https://t.co/qfzX3sMcnb
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) August 1, 2023
The foolish idea that teaching kids less math will advance "equity" has spread from California, which has adopted watered-down guidelines that call for delaying algebra, writes Noah Smith. "Cambridge, Massachusetts recently removed algebra and all advanced math from its junior high schools," also citing "equity."
"Progressive" educators will never admit they believe some students just aren't smart enough to learn algebra, Smith writes. But it's "impossible to avoid the conclusion that the idea is to make all kids equal by making them equally unable to learn."
People in the average IQ band or higher can learn algebra. Those who are well below average perhaps are unable to understand algebra's abstractions--but we in the schools shouldn't toss them aside as unteachable. We should teach them something different, and not pretend we're preparing them to attend a university.
Bringing everyone down to the lowest level is the end result of "equity". We should do better than that.
Update: While I was gone, California approved its controversial math framework that helps ensure a race to the bottom:
The California State Board of Education voted to adopt a new—and much-debated—math framework on Wednesday, concluding a years-long process that involved three drafts, prompted hundreds of suggested revisions, and reignited decades-old arguments over the purpose of math education and the meaning of equity.
The 1,000-page framework aims to put meaning-making at the center of the math classroom, promoting a focus on problem-solving and applying math knowledge to real-world situations. It also encourages teachers to make math culturally relevant and accessible for all students, especially students of color who have been traditionally marginalized in the subject.
“The United States has not been teaching math effectively or equitably. We are one of the lower-achieving countries … and California is below the national average in its achievement in mathematics,” said Linda Darling-Hammond, the president of the California State Board of Education, during the board’s meeting on Wednesday. “This is an area of great need, and change is imperative. The same old, same old will not get us to a new place.”
Here are all my posts referencing Darling-Hammond, stretching back almost 15 years.
Should you ever wonder why I question if I'll make it 4 more years till retirement, this is why.
Update #2: More:
One crucial section of the framework emphasizes teaching “for equity and engagement” and encourages math educators to adopt a perspective of “teaching toward social justice.” The CDE and SBE suggest that cultivating “culturally responsive” lessons, which highlight the contributions of historically marginalized individuals to mathematics, can help accomplish this goal. The guidance further advocates for avoiding a single-minded focus on one way of thinking or one correct answer.
Critics argue that the proposed framework does not prioritize academic achievement. Angela Morabito, a spokesperson for the Defense of Freedom Institute (DFI), stated, “Despite what the proponents of this plan might say, it’s not really designed to boost academic achievement. It’s designed to further a progressive goal that exists in the minds of adults… The math framework really does show misplaced priorities.”
The CDE and SBE acknowledge that math proficiency has been waning across the state, with less than one third of students meeting or exceeding grade-level expectations during the 2021-22 academic year. Data provided by the departments reveals widening achievement gaps, with math proficiency among Black students more than 30 percentage points below that of their White counterparts.
I couldn't even decide what to excerpt; Joanne did such an amazing job on this post, just read the whole thing.
BLUF: high school "data science" classes will not prepare students to succeed in STEM courses at a university.
My commentary: it's just another way to lower standards, no doubt in the name of racial "equity" or some crap.
No, the majority doesn't dictate when it comes to the rights of the minority--rights win out. But what if it's not a matter of rights, but of preference?
Democrats pose as the champions of democracy—except when democracy doesn’t go their way. After 84% of parents in a Virginia county rejected co-ed sex education and gender ideology in schools, the taxpayer-funded school board dismissively announced that “the majority doesn’t always dictate"...
Despite being paid by taxpayer funds and thus being employees of the district’s parents, the school board has rejected poll results showing that parents in the county overwhelmingly reject gender ideology in schools and combining sex education for boys and girls from fourth grade onwards...
The county’s school superintendent, Michelle Reid, dismissed the survey’s results with the ridiculous remark: “Honestly, the majority doesn’t always dictate, right?”
Indoctrination über alles.
Update: Joanne provides a little more information:
Fairfax County, Virginia surveyed the community on plans to mix boys and girls in sex-ed classes in grades starting in fourth grade, reports Nick Minock for 7News. More than 84 percent said "no," as did teachers (100 to 14) and students (60-20).
Remember, it's not just poor kids who deserve excellent schools:
Sixty years ago this summer, Alabama Gov. George Wallace stood before the doors of the University of Alabama to prevent two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from entering.
Wallace had infamously declared in his inauguration speech a few months before: “Segregation now. Segregation tomorrow. Segregation forever.”
His symbolic last stand against racial integration ended when federal marshals escorted Malone and Hood into the school.
The stain of segregation and “separate but equal” schools was slowly coming to an end.
Yet now, 60 years later, look who’s blocking the doors to better schools for minority kids: a new generation of modern-day Wallace Democrats who oppose school-choice programs meant to benefit low-income students, especially black and Hispanic families in districts with failing schools.
We’ve heard a lot of indignation from liberal voices and Democratic politicians in recent days about the Supreme Court decision prohibiting racial preferences in college admissions.But many of these same voices oppose what is arguably the most critical civil-rights issue of our time: the right of minority children to attend great elementary and high schools.
