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9486 in the collection
Robert Bobb: No more unearned promotions for students
Ohanian Comment: The subhead reads DPS to end practice of advancing kids who aren't ready. Where does the emergency financial manager, a fellow with 30 years experience as City Manager in urban governments, get the authority to ignore piles of research on how damaging retention is? Probably he gets it from his certificate from the Broad Foundation, where he was a fellow.
Actually, Eli Broad, Himself, wrote about Bobb's authority last April.
NOTE: These Bobb-ordered assessments for readiness for the next grade start in Pre-K.
This columnist asks readers to rally around Bobb, claiming: Ending social promotion could eventually save the state millions of dollars -- in remedial education, prison, welfare and other costs.
Apparently she's never heard of the great increase in dropouts caused by retention. But there are no rules that columnists have to be informed before spouting off. Oh well, she'd find a Florida teacher who thinks it's fine to keep a child in kindergarten for three years. "Too old? Too bad."
By Rochelle Riley
Detroit Public Schools emergency financial manager Robert Bobb plans to sign an executive order today ending social promotions, the practice of advancing students to the next grade when they're not really ready.
The district began, for the first time, quarterly assessments of student proficiency this week. The results will be used, along with MEAP scores, to chart student progress and determine who needs more help to go onto the next grade.
Such assessments are standard in nearly every other school district in the country, Bobb said.
Social promotion, under the new order, would be prohibited for those pre-K through third-grade students now taking the assessment tests.
"I would classify myself as a hater when it comes to social promotion," Bobb said. "And that's just why my academic team is conducting these assessments ... so we know where these children are deficient."
Bobb said he plans to provide programs and additional help for older students.
"When you're an African-American child, and you are in this type of situation" of being socially promoted through school, "it is so much more difficult to find gainful employment. It triples your lack of opportunity," Bobb said. "We're ending it across the board."
Bobb's action comes one week after the Free Press reported the story of a Denby High School student who graduated without being able to read her diploma. She is 22-year-old Amiya Olden, who walked into ProLiteracy Detroit, the city's largest center for adult reading, and began working to improve her reading. She advanced from a second-grade reading level 18 months ago to a fifth-grade level now. Amiya said she was pushed to act by not being able to read restaurant menus and movie marquees. She also wanted to improve her chances of finding a good job.
"The things that she said really, in terms of what she was unable to do, they really speak to the heart and soul of why reading is so important," Bobb said. "How do you get someone from preschool all the way through high school without learning to read?"
'Shameful' practice
Bobb's executive order in Detroit comes as state Superintendent Mike Flanagan, who also opposes social promotion, continues to develop a statewide district of failing schools, which the Legislature recently approved. This district could contain up to 200 schools whose students are not meeting proficiency standards, Flanagan said. None of the schools would allow students to be promoted until they met academic standards.
"It's shameful," an obviously frustrated Flanagan said of the practice. " 'Let's move these kids out that don't get it. ... Let's keep the kids who are fun to keep and move the rest to alternative schools!' "
Flanagan said he plans to testify before the Legislature next week about his efforts to create the district, which he said could have as many as 100,000 students.
"It will probably be most of the high schools in Detroit, some rural schools, a lot of the usual suspects," he said. But Flanagan made clear that Michigan's education crisis is a state crisis, not one of a single district. Detroit has only 87,000 students, he said, while the state has 2 million. Most of the new district's students will come from outside Detroit.
Bobb faces criticism and resistance from some teachers who say the current testing is designed to ensure that children fail and that Bobb is trying to help dismantle the city school district to make room for charter schools run by businesses tied to politicians in Lansing.
"It's just a setup against the teachers and students of Detroit," said Steve Conn, an activist and math teacher at Cass Technical High School for the past 25 years. Conn said he knows the high school assessment tests include things the students have not been taught.
He said he is part of a group of teachers investigating the results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress test, on which Detroit students made the lowest scores in history. Conn said he doesn't believe students were chosen randomly to take the tests.
Conn did have empathy for Amiya Olden, who graduated while reading at a second-grade level.
"Early intervention could have helped and should have helped her," he said. "But when the resources are not there, and the staff is so overstretched, the early intervention doesn't happen. It's slipshod. ... We try."
Turning things around
As the fighting continues, and Bobb's critics question his authority, they should know this:
Bobb does have academic control of the district. He can make any decision -- academic or otherwise -- that he can financially justify.
"If a penny touches it, there are financial aspects," Bobb's spokesman, Steve Wasko, said late Thursday. "You can't fix the finances without fixing the academics. The main driver (of budget problems) has been bad decisions on the academic side that have driven parents away in droves, taking their money with them."
If he's successful -- and if misguided people don't dismantle the good that may come from his tenure -- there's another bright spot: Ending social promotion could eventually save the state millions of dollars -- in remedial education, prison, welfare and other costs.
For the first time in a long time, the school district is becoming an educational institution instead of a money-distribution machine. We cannot let it end.
Be on the kids' side
I have strong empathy for teachers who spend 12-16 hours, not six, a day working to improve students' lives. They wipe the noses and bring the snacks and give some children the only hug they'll get on a given day.
And that's on top of actually teaching, in some cases, children who cannot spell their own names, or who arrive in their classrooms reading at two to three levels below the rest of the class.
Many of these teachers deserve medals of heroism.
But not all teachers are those teachers. Some are dangerous. They are so afraid of losing their jobs that they lose sight of what their jobs are.
The problem isn't just Detroit's. But the problem has been crippling Detroit. So as Bobb prepares to face off against some teachers and parents over the order, make sure you're on the side of children.
Bobb said that DPS will end social promotion with its youngest students.
So here's a question for critics: How can you determine what children know, and how can you determine whether children are learning, if you don't find out?
Some things, some actions are so sensible that you ask yourself: Why hasn't that been done before?
This is one of those times.
— Rochelle Riley
Detroit Free Press
2010-02-12
http://www.freep.com/article/20100212/COL10/2120380/?imw=Y
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