Empire Falls?

3 Replies to “Empire Falls?”

1. When Superintendent Gallo points to standardized test scores that supposedly show Central Falls failing she doesn’t point out, on the 2009 NECAP reading scores (teaching year), Central Falls is right in the middle of the state’s large urban high schools. At 56% proficiency they are behind the lower-poverty ones (Tolman, 64%; Shea, 62%; Woonsocket, 60%), tied with The MET and Providence Academy for International Studies, and ahead of Central (51%), Hope Leadership (49%), Hope IT (47%), and Alvarez (44%) in Providence.

   The Hope schools are of particular note since they went through a “fire the teachers” restructuring process a few years ago. There is no particular reason to expect the results of Central Falls restructuring to be any different. Now, I don’t believe that standardized tests show you much outside of household income, but Central Falls ranking among similar schools is never mentioned nor is the fact that these same students at Central Falls only had 22% proficiency on the 7th grade tests, 5 years earlier.
   

   So, presuming the same students return, the graduation rate will go from 48% to what?
   Using the success of education reformer Michelle Rhee, it should be darn near 100% in two years.

2. President Obama had this to say about education in the March 2010 issue of Essence magazine:

   “It remains absolutely true that you can have all the money in the world, you can have the fanciest classrooms in the world, the best computers in the world, nicest textbooks in the world, but you are not going to succeed if parents aren’t instilling in their child at a very early age – ‘We are going to set high standards for you. I’m going to check that you do your homework. I’m going to read to you until you get to the point where your’e reading on your own, and then I’m going to make sure that your’re reading books instead of watching TV and playing video games. I’m going to constantly talk to your teachers. I’m going to look at your report card and make sure that you are not settling for Cs when you could be getting As.’ Without that, we’re not going to be high performers.”

   And then he continues with this gem:

   “I know in my own life it’s only because I was pushed and prodded by my folks that I was able to succeed.”

   There it is, the “secret” to a good education. Everything else is just political or related to making money and is certain to fail. Once we accept the obvious truth that the parents are the primary educators of the child (and share this knowledge with everyone) then we’ll begin to see the results that we covet.

3. Linda,
   That more socialist pap!

   😉
   (sarcasm)