Schools “Cheat” to Maintain Graduation Rates
“As deadlines approached for schools to start making passage of the [exit] exams a requirement for graduation, and practice tests indicated that large numbers of students would fail, many states softened standards, delayed the requirement or added alternative paths to a diploma.” (New York Times, Tuesday)
Maybe the schools are accomplishing just what they set out to accomplish.
FEE Timely Classic
“The Central Fallacy of Public Schooling” by Daniel Hager
Comment by Ben Bennett on 12 January 2010:
There are other forms of cheating that we (in the Indiana homeschooling community) have noticed. They have been going on since about 2007, when they raised the dropout age from 16 to 17. In essence, school Supers find ways to convince parents that since their child can’t drop out, and the school doesn’t want to deal with the kid anymore, their only hope is to transfer out and homeschool.
We are noticing the results of this “excommunication” of sorts, this year. Two women were convicted of “educational neglect” for not homeschooling, when they said they were. You can read more about it here: http://skippingschool.wordpress.com/2009/01/02/moms-plead-guilty-to-ed-neglect/ and at a few other links on this site.
A good friend of mine, replied regarding the situation here:
http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20100112/EDIT05/301129944/1021/EDI
The public schools are getting desperate. They will do whatever it takes, even if it’s illegal, to keep their doors open, administrators and teachers paid. The children will always come second.
Watch out for graduation rates looking real good this year, but it’s not simply because they’re dumbing down the curricula; they’re also excommunicating the dead weight (the ones who will bring the test scores down) and tossing them into the streets. Soon thereafter, they will be blaming homeschoolers for not educating their children, and calling for more controls and restrictions.
Public schools will become the outpatient prisons of this decade.