New York's grand plan to end social promotion of third-graders isn't going over too well with some parents:
Parents' groups are speaking out against a plan barring third-graders in public schools from advancing to the next grade unless they pass standardized tests.
Holding students back based on test scores would merely frustrate those with low scores, ensnaring them in a cycle of frustration and underachievement, the groups argue.
"All of the major educational research and testing organizations oppose using test results as the sole criterion for advancement or retention," according to a letter circulated to PTA members by the nonprofit groups Advocates for Children and Class Size Matters. Excerpts from the letter were printed in the New York Times Wednesday...
The city's largest parents' group, United Parents Associations of New York City, last week adopted a resolution opposing the tests.
"Our position is 'no' on retention. It's punitive and unfair," Robin Brown, president of the group, told the New York Post for Wednesday editions. She said parents were angry that Bloomberg had adopted the plan without first soliciting their comments...
An NYTimes Op/Ed has this to say:
...the administration risks frittering away its political capital by reinventing the wheel and rediscovering educational policies that failed miserably in the past. This seemed clearly the case in the mayor's State of the City address, which unveiled strict new promotion standards that would cause as many as 15,000 children each year to repeat third grade — or roughly four times the number that are held back today.
Many in the audience must have instantly flashed back to the catastrophic "gates" program of the 1980's, in which the city famously produced what teachers came to call "bearded seventh graders" — by holding so many children back for so long...The lesson, which the city seems doomed to learn over and over again, was that children who struggle in the early grades are hurt by being held back — but helped by smaller classes, skilled teachers and more intensive instruction...
Mr. Bloomberg has told New Yorkers time and again that he wants them to judge him on how well he does with the schools. He stands a much better chance of doing well if he listens more closely to his critics and takes a less combative attitude toward the union.
Posted by kswygert at February 11, 2004 03:26 PM