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Detroit Public Schools to mail kids homework packets due first day of class
Rich Gibson Comment: Turning children into data. . . then parody becomes real.
After Painting School Doors Blue (closing 40, laying off hundreds of teachers) Detroit PS sends 62-page homework packages to students two weeks before school opens, but 2000 teachers and Dozens of Principals Have No Assignments: Detroit elementary and middle-school students don't resume classes for two weeks, but they already have homework.
News Flash: DPS officials said all teaching assignments will be distributed before classes start.
by Wesley Lowery
Detroit elementary and middle-school students don't resume classes for two weeks, but they already have homework.
Detroit Public Schools announced Monday it will mail 62-page packets of homework this week to 28,650 students in grades three through eight. The packets, which must be finished and turned in the first day of classes, focus on areas in which DPS students have tested poorly.
The initiative is the first time DPS students have been given homework before the start of school, said DPS spokeswoman Kisha Verdusco.
"The district has been making an effort this summer to ensure that students will be in class and ready to learn on the first day of school," she said. "We want to ensure that both teaching and learning will occur on Sept. 7."
The booklets will be mailed in a back-to-school packet that contains school assignments, immunization updates and other information. They contain literacy exercises and activities that emphasize subjects some students have had difficulty with on standardized tests such as the Michigan Educational Assessment Program exam.
The MEAP test is administered annually by the Michigan Department of Education. The agency said it was not involved in planning the DPS program but supports the idea behind it.
"There is often a 'brain-drain' for students over the summer, and often for those students most at risk" said Jan Ellis, an MDE spokeswoman. "Detroit's effort to ensure parents are involved in areas of student involvement and success is critical."
To get the best results from students in many of Detroit's lowest performing schools, the district needs to follow a "whole systems" model that involves teachers, parents, principals and students, Ellis said.
This year, 40 of the 92 DPS schools were included on Michigan's "persistently lowest achieving schools" list.
"An effort like this that connects schools, students and parents in learning is important," Ellis said.
The program's success will depend on getting parents involved, said Julie Spielberger, a research fellow at the University of Chicago who specializes in early childhood education and school readiness.
Spielberger said parents will need to actively encourage their children to complete the assignments. Even then, the program may not produce measurable improvement in student achievement, she cautioned.
"I would question whether this would be enough to boost scores," Spielberger said. "But I wouldn't rule out the possibility that this program gets some individual students engaged."
The union that represents the district's roughly 4,500 teachers said DPS should first tell instructors where they will be assigned this school year.
"It's great that the district has found time to mail homework to all of the students, but their higher priority should be mailing teaching assignments to teachers," said Mark O'Keefe, executive vice president of the Detroit Federation of Teachers.
O'Keefe said as many as 2,000 DPS teachers have yet to receive their classroom assignment.
"It's great if students come in with their homework completed, but we need to make sure there is a teacher in that classroom," O'Keefe said.
DPS officials said all teaching assignments will be distributed before classes start.
— Wesley Lowery
Detroit News
2010-08-24
http://www.detnews.com/article/20100824/SCHOOLS/8240364/1026/DPS-to-mail-kids-homework-packets-due-first-day-of-class#ixzz0xZY5OlRt
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