Certificates of "achievement"
The Massachusetts Board of Education is going ahead with its plan to award "certificates of achievement" to students who don't pass the MCAS, and thus cannot receive their diplomas. Critics of the decision believe that the award is a way for the Board of Education to give the student something, but this something is not very meaningful or useful:
The class of 2003 is the first that must pass the math and English portions of the MCAS exams to earn a diploma. After three tries, 12,000 seniors still have not passed.
Critics say the certificate will allow students to cross the stage at graduation but gives them few options thereafter. A diploma is required for most jobs and professions, and is necessary to receive financial assistance for continuing education...Education Commissioner David Driscoll said that once the state agrees on the final version of this certificate, it would "shop it around" to businesses and schools to convince them to hire or admit these students.
Driscoll also asked that federal financial aid be made available to students who don't pass.
Say what? So, a student must pass the exam to recieve a diploma, and the purpose of that exam is to underscore the standards set by the diploma - but if you don't pass, the Education Commissioner will do his best to get businesses to hire you and the government to give you money? Excuse me, but what's the point of passing the exam, then? It's just amazing to see what educrats will do as they contort themselves in order to avoid inconveniencing any student, no matter how unaccomplished.
And this is just sad:
Brookline High School junior Josh Kaufman said he planned to testify Tuesday against the certificate. A learning disability has kept him from passing the math portion of the MCAS, he said. He said the certificate won't help him get into college..."Ironically, I received a letter from Johns Hopkins University asking me to apply and the letter with the failing MCAS math scores within days of each other," Kaufman said in prepared testimony..."These certificates would leave many special education students who would otherwise have bright futures with little or no opportunity."
Josh, I hate to break it to you, but universities send out many, many letters to students encouraging them to apply, and those letters don't always go to students who have the qualifications. Your failing MCAS math score may very well be an indication that you are not able to do college-level math, because you aren't able to pass a test of high-school-level math. Then again, the MCAS math items may not be difficult so much as "linguistically confusing", which means the items may not be very useful for measuring math skills. Which means that Josh would be correct in taking Massachusetts to task for refusing to award him with a diploma, and those of us who criticize high-school exit exams would have a leg to stand on.
Here's a thought - let's go back to making high-school courses difficult, and rewarding. Let's flunk out those students who can't do the work. The kids can take tests for accountability to satisfy the government, but they won't need to take a test to verify the usefulness of the diploma. And let's make college admissions exams more difficult, so that we don't have to deal with the dilemma of high school exit exams that are more difficult than college entrance exams.