No time for a real post now, but here's a thought for you. I heard on the way home on NPR that the drop-out rate from California high schools has increased 4% in 2007 over 2006, largely due to the students' inability to pass the exit exam. This past year was the first it was required for students to graduate. It's been administered for several years, but it has not, in the past, been a graduation requirement.
I almost feel that it's a good thing. If these 4% of students won't stick it out an extra year to study for and pass their exams, are they really the people we want to have a diploma? I've felt for years now that there are FAR too many students going to college who don't deserve to be there. I don't mean monetarily; I mean that they don't have the basic skills required for college education and are not willing to study (ie. a classmate who asked for a calculator to figure out 6x9). I feel the same way about a high school diploma. Where will our nation be in 50 years, if the value of a diploma drops the way the dollar is?
On the other hand, I'm saddened to hear that 4% more students have dropped out due to a test. I hate to think about who these kids are. For some reason, I don't think it is the kids who had a good school and a decent home life. Are we failing out the impoverished people just because they are poor? I know that basic algebra is required on that test. I also knew plenty of my classmates in high school graduated with only a barely passing grade in pre-algebra.
Now we're back to the test is good, though. If the test had forced some of my classmates to buck up and study 2 years of math in high school instead of the obligatory "Pre-algebra," wouldn't that have been a good thing? Also, if the kids who are poor don't pass the first time, shouldn't they study harder and try again instead of dropping out?
Yes, their lives are way harder than mine ever was. We're back to "the test is bad" again. Now I'm worrying that I'm starting to sound like a republican. ARGH! I ask you... is the test good or bad? Consider that for me while I run off to improv class.
What I'm reading: Still haven't finished The Grey King or Birth House. Instead of reading either, I started Devil in the White City. So far, it's pretty good, but I can't figure out why they listed Central Park as being worked on from 1856 to 1868. I'm reasonably sure it was 1811. I must research this, but another time.
PS: I'm terribly bad at the short posts, aren't I?
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