ROCKPORT, Maine — Teachers, parents and taxpayers have many questions about standards-based education, a way of teaching that asks students to master different subjects at their own pace. A conference Thursday at the Samoset Resort will gather 100 teachers and local school administrators along with experts to talk about how to implement the approach. There also will be a public meeting at 6 p.m. for community members to ask the Maine Department of Education commissioner questions about his push toward standards-based education.
“We’ll bring in experts from around the state who are already doing this standards-based work to start the conversation at the educator level. They want to know the nuts and bolts about how this actually works in a classroom,” said Alan Hinsey, the executive director of Many Flags One Campus Foundation, which is hosting the all-day conference. Many Flags’ goal is to host a high school, vocational school and colleges in one building in the midcoast. WIthout state funding to do this yet, the nonprofit has been working to host educational forums in the area.
Teachers will take the day to attend various workshops. Then, that night, the public will get to ask their questions of Stephen Bowen, the education commissioner. The two things people tend to worry about is the abolition of age-based grade levels and grade letters, according to the Maine Department of Education’s spokesman David Connerty-Marin. In standards-based education, students are told what skills and subjects they must master, and when they do, they can move on to the next level. No A, B, C, D or F — the student either is proficient or isn’t.
“If they’re struggling with math concepts, you don’t want to rush them through one math concept to rush on to another math concept that they won’t understand. Meanwhile, they do great with reading, so let them move on there and work with them on math.”
The students who do well and move quickly through material — the typical honor roll students, — won’t have GPAs their parents can brag about. But colleges have other ways to test knowledge, Connerty-Marin said.
“We are hung up on who is on the top of the heap and whose second or third from the top. Colleges can figure that out. They don’t need grades to figure it out,” Connerty-Marin said.
Many Flags hosts two conferences a year in the midcoast about education. When Hinsey asked superintendents what they wanted to discuss this time, they all agreed: standards-based education. Originally, Many Flags wanted to have about 50 teachers from Belfast to Waldoboro come and talk about the issue, but Hinsey got so many requests that they allowed 100 more.
“These districts had to get substitute teachers to send these teachers here. They were willing to pay for it — that’s how important this is,” said Hinsey. “Standards-based education is coming. It’s coming. It’s moving this way in Maine. The DOE is moving it forward. So how will this work in our classrooms? I hope this makes it less scary for people and I hope people ask the right questions because we want this to work. We want parents and community members to get their voices heard.”
As a show of good faith in his own educational theory, I suggest Mr. Bowen propose eliminating the legal requirement that a student turn 5 by October 15 in order to enter public school (20-A MRSA 5201(2)(B)).
my son has been in public school since age 4…it all depends on if the chosen school has younger pre-k grades or not. I would like to see the Oct. 15 age thing dropped though. my 2 yr old is smart and i would love for her to be able to go to pre-k when she is close to turning 4 rather than a full year later when she’ll be turning 5 a short time into the year.. :/
And what information will college admissions officers get? They expect transcripts with grades.
If you give up the grades, they’ll rely on standardized tests, giving a boost to students that test well and who have received test prep services. Who are those kids? It’s very well established that they’re high income students.
David Connerty-Marin seems awfully blase about the prospect of no transcripts for all of Maine’s students.
I homeschooled my three children. We used a very similar style as is being suggested here. We did not test our children but kept portfolios of their work. We did not grade work, assign grades or hold them to one grade level. They did NOT take any standardized tests, no SATs or other college entrance exams. Two of them have graduated from college. Many colleges no longer require them. Transcripts can be made from the information in student portfolios and samples can be included.
Children need the freedom to naturally explore their world, with freedom to advance when ready or to linger longer on challenging academics. We need to follow children’s leads and their natural and innate desire to learn about their world.
True Native: I don’t want this to sound cheeky, but truly want to know because I’m worried about my own kids…. What kind of colleges are they that don’t look for grades and SAT’s. Our school district has some very vocal opponents of this movement, and often are stating that MANY colleges will NOT accept the Maine diploma readily without a good way of recognizing the good students in a way meaningful to them. If they have thousands of applicants for 100’s of slots, the ones that stick out will get the slots. If nothing from Maine is recognizable as sticking out, our students don’t have a prayer of getting in. I’m talking the Ivy league schools, or other highly regarded schools where it is very competitive to get into.
How many children in Maine have parents with the money to send them to Ivy League schools?
If you have enough money your child can get into just about any school in the country.
Harvard and Yale take home school students. You don’t need a GED or High School diploma to go to a state school now….
Here’s an article that may help answer your question: http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000002/00000234.asp
More and more colleges today are recognizing the successes of homeschooled kids. My daughter is “technically” in 3rd. grade. However, she does 5th-8th grade work in history and science.
And more than likely because it is more standard based versus institutional thinking with grades or grading.
You’re right. I don’t give her grades at all. I just write the score above her paper. Then she has to correct her missed problems writing the correction either under or over the incorrect answer so she can see why she made the mistake.
I would love to see the evidence to support the claim that colleges are not readily accepting Maine diplomas. I know many Maine students who are at very prestigious Ivy League schools.
This is a disaster waiting to happen. This little social experiment has been done in other states and has simply led to lowering of the standards – Level III (equivalent to a “B”) is now the new “C”; prepare yourself for mediocrity! I would not allow my children to be educated in this watered-down system.
they are already getting a watered down education….teaching to the slowest kid in the class so they aren’t left behind.
Its about to get worse……
alot worse.
The system is watered down NOW. Have you been in a classroom lately? Seen the watered down textbooks whose main focus is to prepare students for tests? What we are doing now is creating mediocrity.
Following educational styles that we know give good results is a no brainer. I can’t understand why people can’t accept that there are better ways of working with students and that change does not equal watered down.
Yes, because in the workplace, you can take all the time you want to get a job done. Just more liberal educational crap that is leaving students in the dust when compared to other developed countries and laying the foundation for an entirely new generation of occupiers.
I have to ask this question. Why is it not possible for someone such as yourself to post a comment without bringing politics into the equation?
Is he wrong? I would say no.
Homeschoolers have used standard’s based education for many years with no grades or grade levels. If a student is advanced in math they get to move forward, if they are weaker in other subjects they have more time to master them.
We HAVE to change education in a major way. This is a step in the right direction.
what is a teacher supposed to do with 30 students at 30 different levels of proficiency? It is different with one parent and one student.
I was going to say the exact same thing. I have homeschooled 4 of my 6 children since the day they started K and I know exactly what they have mastered and what their weaknesses are. I can’t imagine attempting to do this with 30-90 children, most of which I have never seen before September. I can have one child in 3 different grades, but the chaos of doing that in a non-one classroom setting would be unbelievable. One teacher guiding a small group of students throughout their school career was how the rural schools of the 1870’s-1930’s worked and those children usually ended up with an 8th grade education superior to a high school one of today.
We do have to change education, the current system is not working, but I think it would start with raising the standards, not eliminating the bar entirely.
I don’t know many schools where a teacher has 30-90 children in the classroom.
Think about it for a minute…we have increased the school day and the school year, we have continually raised standards and reliance on test results to determine progress. We have tried to hold teacher’s accountable. But what has it done? Has all of this raising standards produced better students?
The answer is no as things have continually gotten worse. More is not better so let’s try the less approach that many educators have used and seen wonderful results.
Middle and high school teachers can have 30 students per class. Multiply that by 3 or 4 classes per day to get up to 120 students that a single teacher must be able to “know” in terms of strengths and weaknesses.
I agree that there are too many regulations/mandates on teachers and schools and that dictates from government have made it more difficult to impart knowledge. However, the decline of educational excellence in the US is a multi-faceted problem. Some of the contributing factors include the breakdown of the family and individual responsibility, the reduction of the importance of education in our society, the increasing coarseness of our culture, and the intrusion of ever-more distant bureaucrats making decisions that should be handled at a local level. I’m in favor of vouchers so parents can decide where they want their child to be educated.
You should attend the conference to find out.
No, this is a step, a leap , further in the direction that has caused the problem we are in.
The lib’s started tinkering with the system back in the 60’s and 70’s, then Carter raised the anti and it has led us here.
Chip away at something until you create an “emergency” then enact radical “reforms” . The lib’s have used this tact in almost every segment of our society and it seems now is the time for them to try to pull it all together.
It’s up the “ante.” Clearly, we do have an emergency.
The phrasing was correct,nautical and poker term,wrong word I’m afraid.
The state of our school system has nothing to do with liberals or conservatives.
The human body and brain are constantly evolving and as result our technology is changing faster than we can keep up with it. We know more about human development and the brain than ever before. Our teaching methods need to evolve so that we can use the knowledge that we have now and our technology to meet the needs of today’s students.
We are not in Kansas anymore Toto.
And you think this idea is the answer?
I do. I know that it works. It can work in larger groups. This approach develops students who can think conceptually, who love to learn and can problem solve.
Yes, we are constantly evolving, but we have yet to evolev beyond the point where we still have to master the basic’s.
“We are not in Kansas anymore Toto.” You are right, but it’s pretty clear you live in the Land of Oz!
I’m in the land of reality. You are in the land of denial thinking more of the same is good and that something totally new is bad.
Simply because someone like that puts no more thought into their political ideology than they put into choosing their favorite sports team.
And how’s our present institutionalized education doing for us?
Steven Bowen (Maine DOE) is no liberal. Not even close.
Best post on here.
Trying to make school into a factory assembly line is how we got here.
Well I know you and most teacher do the best you can. We need to let the teacher teach . It is not all about test scores .Let see get a higher test score ya what dose that prove does it increase a childs IQ ? What is going to keep kids interested in education for the long term is much more important than the things they teach today. I remember being in high school history class I would just tear the book to pieces . They were only interested in the answers the book said. I did not help my grade much but the true interest was worth much more in the long run. I would ask questions like why was Hiroshima more important than Dresden . Why was Columbus a hero? I might have drove my teacher nuts . He was glad someone had a real interest and could explain things off the record. That did way more to teach learning than the book ever did.
I need to bring this information to my next performance review in July. I am sure that my manager will be inpressed and I’ll get a few more weeks off next year.
Why are conservatives so eager to implement an educational system that discourages excellence and rewards mediocrity?
Products of our educational system where they have been programmed for so long, they can no longer see that there are many ways to approach problems in society. They cannot seem to understand that what we have been doing is not working. We have to think outside the box.
Here’s thinking outside the box. How about just going back to the system where the student actually has to get a passing grade or they get held back and repeat the year. Oh wait, we can’t do that, we might embarass the student or we might have to deal with an angry parent.
This is just another gimmick and in the end will do nothing but further destroy the American Educational System.
With that said….you think it’s great if your child gets an 85 or heck even a 93 on an assignment? Think about this….if a child gets an 85 they are not getting 15% of what was taught to them. Or even the student with a 93, they aren’t getting 7% of what was taught to them. What is wrong with expecting a student to totally understand a lesson? It is easier in the long run when they master the basics. I know 8th graders reading at a 4th grade level. So the teachers teach to them and the rest are held back…
No child held back is what standards based education is about!
Here’s an idea…we stop using a grading system. How about this…you have a math sheet to do. Once you complete it you take it to the teacher. She goes down through the page and marks the ones that are correct but then asks the student to go back to their seats and work on the ones that they did not get wrong. If they have more than 50 % wrong then they go work with that student for a few minutes helping him with a conceptual understanding. You have them go back and try the wrong ones over again.
When the student can work through the page and can answer all of the questions correctly then they go on to the next page to do or the next thing to learn. They don’t get a grade. There is no need for a grade. We want students to know material versus getting a good grade. Children can work at their own pace, going ahead in some areas, slowing down in others.
Progress is determined by what skills they have mastered and not by what grade you have recorded in your grade book.
I’m about to get my teaching certificate and I can’t wait to incorporate what I learned teaching my children into a classroom situation. There is NO doubt in my mind that it can be done. I can”t wait to get started.
Yes, there are many ways to approach problems in the society. But why is the State on the verge of mandating that all school districts in Maine choose this system?
As a country, we are moving toward standards base education. I didn’t read in this article that Maine is about to require all schools in Maine to follow this approach.
How do you determine if a student has achieved “excellence” if there are no grades?
My point exactly. There is little incentive in this system to excel.
They want to excel because learning is interesting and relevant. Education is based on mastery of skills rather than grades, honor roll, special recognition. In the real world we our lives don’t fixate on “grades” but on mastery of skills and how to get things done. Grades are artificial and meaningless because the focus is mastery.
You don’t – they simply “meet the standard” or “exceed the standard”.
Who said there aren’t grades at all? Kids still take assessments-they’re even more important. They assess understanding of a learning result standard- not just a grade to be mixed into some fuzzy average with class attendance and “participation” points. The “standard” in my school is headed up, not down with standard based grading. We’re working harder than ever to get all kids where they need to be and our NECAP scores show it!
Our scores are going down on this system…
Well The truth no one seems to want to address is poverty drags down the scores. Look at Finland a socialized Nation . I am not saying it is right but they have the best schools in the world . They also have no poverty to speak of. If test score only drop a bit schools are doing an ok job with child poverty rates as high as they are. I am not a liberal but I like to look at numbers the numbers seem to tell me thier is a social class system in America . Anyone can make it but with a lot more obstacales in the way . Not much is done to level the playing field.
Textbook companies also own standardized testing companies. They are one in the same. The test companies continually manipulate the tests and it looks like “scores” are going down. Then in swoops the textbook folks convincing schools to by their new and improved curriculum with all kinds of bells and whistles that no doubt will bring those test scores up and around and round we go.
It’s not about excellence. It’s about meeting the standard.
Because they don’t move forward until the master the material. Grades are not needed because it is about mastering skills. Most homeschooled children aren’t given grades. Their parent/teacher focuses on mastering of material and not on what grade average their child gets.
why are you backing an educational system that holds back children in its current form?
There are administrators from RSU 2 who are presenting at this conference. They are considered experts on Standards Based Education. What they don’t tell you is that they have implemented this from the top down, with little to no input from parents or the community. The community was promised a strategic plan two years ago, and they have yet to produce one. The juniors at the high schools are in their third year of this experiment, and the grading system has changed every year. One administrator referred to it as “forced altruism;” after all, some kids have to be the guinea pigs, right? Just pray it’s not your kid, when your school is mandated to adopt this, per L.D. 1422, which got a unanimous vote out of the Education Committee.
I have found this group (RSU2) does not like to be questioned or receive any criticism from teachers, parents, and especially not students. There was an earlier opinion article in the BDN a week or two ago that expressed the frustrations of parents in this district. My advice – elect a new school board and throw out the superintendent if you as parents want your school back.
This isn’t liberal or conservative…it’s just lazy.
It’s not lazy, it emphasizes proficiency. Students that are being held back waiting for everyone else to catch-up and are bored can move to the next level. Students that need help can actually get it. What’s lazy is not listening to what works.
Most schools already have honors courses or AP courses that allow those kids who want/need additional challenges to get them. If testing and evaluation and grades are done away with, how do you know whether the kid has learned anything and is ready to move up to a higher level?
The only way for colleges to determine whether a student is good enough at learning to be accepted is via some sort of testing and evaluation. How do you suppose it’s going to go for those students who have spent their first 12 years of school not having to “make the grade” when they are suddenly confronted with the pressure of having to do well on SAT’s or other standardized tests that colleges use to evaluate prospective students?
Not all colleges require SAT scores. Students have portfolios using this approach.
That is in theory; talk to teachers in RSU’s that have it implemented – outside the ear range of their administrators! This system has not been proven to work – you need to look at states that have implemented it; my niece and nephew went through this type of educational system and complained the standards were too easy and they were held back any time they tried to move ahead as this model supposedly allows – so I do not know where you get your information.
Amen!
If you would like to get a great explanation of the reasoning behind this, then please take 11min 40 sec and watch this animation .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U
Will this type of educational program not require score/clocks in the gym?
I never liked those.
Should learning be a competition? Who wins when some kids learn and some don’t? Who will support the losers for the rest of their lives?
Not being an educator, I have a question. Will this standards-based system allow children who are lazy to just flounder through 12 years and still come out as functionally illiterate as our current system seems to allow? Are the children ever going to be held accountable?
The dumbing down of American youth continues.
But the teachers union is doing great……………….
This “reform” is coming from Governor LePage not the teachers’ union.
Neither… It’s happening all over- goes back to the 90’s and No Child Left Behind legislation – which had strong bipartisan support. Remember Bush’s quotes on the ‘soft bigotry of low expectations.’ Some schools gave easy grades. Expecting all to set higher standards has been tough but it’s happening.
“These districts had to get substitute teachers to send these teachers here. They were willing to pay for it — that’s how important this is,” said Hinsey.
Hmmmm…..I wonder where that money comes from.
Golly, do the districts ask the teachers to pony up out of their own pockets to hire the substitute teachers?
This sounds like an Idea . I do not know how it will work in the real world? It seems to me Grade are more closely tied to homework grades and not what the kid has learned or test scores. Looking at the school grading system we have now . In some of my sons classes 50% of grades are homework 30% are test scores . So one kid has a home life not conducive to doing homework does not do it or dose not pass it in the best grade they could hope for is a 50 if the got 100 on every test. Another kid has an educated stay at home mom helps with homework kid gets 100 on every homework grade but fails every test with a 69 . He gets a 91 . Witch kid would learned more the kid with 100 on every test or the kid with a 69 on every test? Kids get a science fair project one kid daddy does it for him . another kids parents do not help at all or can not . One kid get an A the other has not project. No all kids are on a level playing field from the start. The relationship between a kids home environment and grades is a lot bigger than the relationship between what the kids really learned is my point. seems like it sets even smart disadvantage kids up to fail. Education an I did not always go so well . Many times in school I would get the highest grade on a final exam or test but a poor grade in the class. If we could base it more on what a kid learned than obedience to authority maybe the system would be more fair.
The problem with todays system is that they have no expectations of children being held accountable. It takes the children a nano second to know that they really don’t have to perform to get moved ahead with thier friends. When they go from first to second grade and haven’t mastered the skill needed to start second grade they are on the road to failure. Which will only increase as the years roll by. You can’t expect to build an education on air. Every child needs a foundation to work upon.
Well they do try to hold kids back in middle school. Some of the kids that are held back learned more than some that get a diploma. Just saying its against State law to hold back a special ed kid. Kids being held back at a latter age are at a much higher risk of dropping out of school. It is not a perfect world. Why do they tend not to hold kids back at a younger age? Its all about the test scores I see no prof holding a kid back is beneficial to most kids . They might test higher for a year or so loose the gain and tend to drop out at about 3 times the rate. With todays drop out rate around 20% the majority comming from disadvantaged homes that makes the kids have less than a 50/50 shot at a diploma. Then some will get pushed on who did not learn at 4th grade level.
Unless a child is mentally challanged, there is no reason to see children getting through elementary school who can’t read, write and do basic math. These are the foundations that all education is built on.
By the time a child gets to middle school, they should have a foundation. That is what elementary school is supposed to do. If they can’t accomplish this task they need to fix that problem.
I think my son lexile level on his SRI test is in the higher 1,200s above most 12th graders but is in real danger of being held back In 7th . I can not get through to him that these teachers seem to think homework is important. Education has its issues . My point is if he never learned another thing is would still have learned more than some who never stayed back. Different kids learn differently . Sorry thier is no one size fits all. I may have a whole different way of thinking than most people do.
You’ve explained it nicely! That’s the goal.
I know I think outside the box a bit. Just seems real difficult to make a system that is fair to everyone. Not everyone thinks the same way. Teachers should have the freedom and the knowledge to understand this. Look at an MBTI Jungs Idea. It might not be completely on the money . But the point is most people have different ways of learning. An INTP is going to be much different than a ESFJ . I see how it has its flaws . What is the objective of education? to Teach kids to pass a test? To make them interested in life long learning? I guess we need real insight to the major objective of an education. This whole education expert bull that you need algebra 11 to be a mechanic . HMMMMMMMM I can think of many school teacher that would have a problem with algebra11. I do not expect or would want you to agree with everything I said. Just we need clear an honest Ideas not some idealistic nonsense.
It is not a perfect world . On size dose not fit all. I did not get along very well with education. By nature I always question authority. It dose not make me a bad person . Just a different way of thinking . I the way I think caused me a few problems in education . So people might see me as a bit abrasive . Well if you always look at the world through rose colored glasses you will never see problems or think of ways to improve them. Look at society over the last 500 years and how thing have changed. Back then slavery was a good thing. Well I certainly hope that 500 years into the future we can look back and say wow see how far we have come. Avoiding unpopular questions and not looking at what the greater good for society as a whole is not going to help. When we have a high school drop out rate running 20% something is wrong. Let say 70% of people in jail did not get a diploma . Well if we cut the drop out rate in half I do not believe crime will drop 35% but it might drop 15% welfare will not be cut in half but it might be 25% less . Send all high school kids to 4 years of college who is going to collect your trash or work at fast food places. Like going a 100k in debt is a good thing when you have an $8/ hour job?
I am probably a little old fashioned. I consider myself to be an independent middle of the roader who has voted a little more republican then democrat and I have little to no use for the far right or the far left. I consider a young person’s job in life to be to go to school, learn what is taught and become a productive member of our society.
A young person’s education is part of the preparation for their employment rather it be as a laborer or President. Receiving a grade for studying is just like being compensated for your labor in the work world. And just like in the work world the harder you labor the better grade or compensation you earn.
If you study hard enough and earn the grades you get promoted to the next grade conversely in the world of work if you labor enough and earn the right you get the promotions.
That said if a youngster excells in a field let them take classes equal to their ability but have them pass their individual grades. School is a learning experience not only about what one learns but about reward and failure. Simply being proficient gives no one a sence of sucess or any drive to be the best. We need every child to learn to be the best they can be so that as adults they will continue to be the best they can be. That is how this country became what it is and is how we will continue to succeed. If we only strive for proficiency we will not succeed.
In the work world the employer grades his employees every day. Those who work hardest and learn their jobs are the ones who get the better raises and promotions. In hard times the employer lays off his grade C employees first and his grade A employees last.
We as a society should not be satisfied with being proficient nor should we be satisfied with our children being proficient. They and we should strive to be the best we can be and for that effort we should be justly compensated.
All that being said — no thank you to standards based education — give me passing grades and compensation.
Well I have seen In the real world hard work is only one small factor. The majority of people work hard enough to keep a job . You attitude and who you know seem to be much more important than the work you do. I wish school would teach these kids how the real world really works. Do you think for a minute GW. bush would have been president if not for his connections? how about Lepage? with Perter snows help. It goose on and on . Would Ted Kennedy have made it? Not a partison thing by any means. I am not saying anyone can not make it . Just saying hard work is only part of it. A lot of Teachers have no Idea how the real world really works. Hell thier pay is based on education not how hard they work or even what they learned. Get a higher degree means higher pay. Well I can tell you right now that that dose not always mean they are better or smarted than a teacher with a lessor degree.
I agreed with a lot of that. But- using your “factory” model- Do you get ‘compensated’ just for showing up? (attendance grades) or having a good attitude? (participation points) or do you have to work to some ‘standard’ of quality?
I cringe with your referral to a ” factory” model — I would rather it be referred to as a ” reward ” model. One is rewarded based on what one earns. Simply being judged proficient does not encourage the student to strive to achieve. Gee I got a B — guess I need to work harder and study more so I can get the A is the attitude we need to instill, not just to be proficient. We need our schools to provide our students with the atttitude of achievement not proficiency.
There is a part II to this issue — the parents need to promote their children to expect to be the best they can be — they need to strive for the A while realizing that if they have done their best but gotten the B that is also success.
As a single parent I raised two children. I expected and instilled in them to expect the A. They did not always get the A but they strived for it. One graduated college with honors and a 3.98 gpa the other one graduated from Harvard. They both have excelled and are successful adults who quite honestly have succeed on their own work and merits.
To answer your question — just like in the industry where I work — sorry no compenstion for just showing up or the good attitutde — compensation is based on productivity
Participation points seems to me to be a bias in the form of a personality . I do not think more introverted people would want to stand up in front of a classroom. It is in not a true measure of what it learned. I guess I have issues with education . Being a slow learner and all . Funny when my teacher saw my asvab scores. They were way higher than his. I guess I am one of those people that will see something wrong with everything. I am OK with that . In the real world a dose not mean as much as one would think. Certain qualities like the childs self efficacy , Compliance to authority are much more worth much more .
We certainly need to address this matter as a priority. Our current system of elementary Ed. has expectations built into it that mandates we teach at the minimum level for the minimum student’s abilities.
Grade classes have become antiques, as have our grading system.
We should be teaching our children at their maximum capabilities, not holding them back to accommodate the slowest learners.
Those students that excel should not be kept or hindered in their education simply because of an others inability to keep pace.
My concern with standards based education (in place in my district since my older child entered school in 2004) is that it does not truly offer the ability to progress ahead when mastery of a topic area is proven. My son is a 7th grader who is frustrated by the slow pace at which his math class is progressing despite being labeled Advanced Pre-Algebra. He is capable of working several grade levels ahead, but is stuck doing the same work, at the same pace as the rest of his class. Maybe an ideal world would allow students in the same classroom to be working at many different levels, but the reality of 25 kids working on 25 different assignments is a lot for one teacher to handle. With our 4 point system where 3 means “meets the standard” and 4 means “exceeds the standard,” a student must get all questions plus the extra credit questions correct to earn a 4, but can miss several questions to earn a 3. He feels nothing is more deflating than hearing that the kid next to him who gets only 85% correct earned a 3 compared to his 99% which also earned a 3. At the end of the day, my child earns the same “grade” in math. He is a bright student, but when it kills me when he says, “If I can’t be perfect, why should I try hard when I can just not study and still get 85% correct and a 3 just like the kid next to me?” I am not suggesting that the old system did not have flaws. It also prevented kids on the top of the spectrum from moving ahead more quickly as their abilities would have allowed, but this standards-based approach is not yet meeting the needs of all students. I worry that our best and brightest students are feeling the tug toward mediocrity and it is a sad goal for the future of Maine.
When i was in high school there was a similar type of situation on a different level. We had tiered classes, your basic classes (math, english, science, etc.), but we also had two other levels of classes that were more advanced as an option if you so chose or if one was full up by the time you choose classes you had something to fall back on or challenge yourself a bit more so you could still fill your credit requirements. But when you got your report at the end of the semester there was a number at the top that told you what rank you were in out of all the students in your grade. I had friends taking other classes that breezed through with some essentially pass/fail electives that were ranked high while others that were ranked lower may have been taking the harder classes and doing well they were still ranked below anyone who excelled in the easier classes.
Now we’re taking “every one wins” to a whole new level: “Every one passes”. This might work in one room Amish school houes, but in a public school with huge numbers? I give it an F or in this lingo: Fail.
Isn’t it strange that years ago people who graduated from high school were better educated than they are now in the basics that get you through life. All this PC, feel-good, crap isn’t bringing better people into the workforce.
This concept has been around since the early 80’s. Not a shock that it is just finding it’s way to Maine. What they aren’t telling you…
1. Each child is tracked.. for the rest of their lives.
2. This was the beginnings of requiring your kid’s social security number ( to track them ).
3. This was the start of the standardized tests, and the teaching to pass the test. Look on your kid’s MEA score sheet it doesn’t say pass and fail.. it says proficient not proficient and a couple of other choices.
4. This is government run Montessori. Which frankly I’ve seen first hand and it doesn’t work. The teachers in Maine are way too content to set back and drink out of their thermoses all day. They have a union contract that says they can do as little as possible and there’s nothing the parents can do about it. They aren’t going to lift a finger let alone both hands to provide 20 different levels of work in each subject everyday.
5. Do you really want your child to become a government guinea pig? Followed for the rest of their lives to record their income, future schooling, job retention, level of education of spouse, number of children?
Read up folks like I said this has been around a long time and NONE OF IT IS GOOD!
I have no idea how we ever got along with
grades before. I have no idea how these intellectual
people ever got through school with the concept of
teachers teaching, the students who wanted to learn learning
and the parents who cared what their children were doing caring.
If I was just marked proficient as opposed to being graded,
I would have applied to Harvard and became a real elitist
intellectual. Oh but Harvard would KNOW I was proficient
or not by their testing or standards. Nawww…give me those
lousy old fashioned grades so I can see for myself what a kid
is doing. If he/she is a b or c student and is trying, so be it.
Doing just enough to be proficient without some other means
to have a goal to shoot for, this just seems to be a way to allow
someone to do just enough to get by and have no motivation to
reach for a higher (grade) level.
There is a school right in Bangor that already teaches like this, its called Job Corps, it is all self paced classes, take like a CNA class, this is normally a 3 month course, some kids in Job Corps have been in the CNA class for 6 months to a year. So this will get some kids to graduate in 6 years, and some to graduate at the age of 30?? Sounds like a perfect plan to me.
As a student who virtually failed out of Camden Hills High School, because of the letter grading system, I would advocate that amendments could be made to the current process of weighing a student’s progress in the classroom. I was fortunate in that my life’s decisions have led me to pursue higher education in Edinburgh Scotland. Hopefully my experience in another system of standardized grading can shed some light on anyone’s concerns.
Firstly, there is one very common trend that tends to happen when a letter grading system goes out. That is that instead of a teacher grouping the work into the “is this an ‘A’ piece of work or not” perception tends to be overshadowed by “is this work worth above a certain percentile”. The key difference is that when a purely percentile based system is in place, the common perception changes to “there is no way that this student will attain 100% of my criteria”. When that becomes the baseline, it can quickly become a very slippery slope from “not 100% to not 80%, 70%, etc.”. This is the reason that most students in other developed countries have a low GPA by American standards. For example, in this last semester I had two classes above a 70%. In the UK that means I am rated at a Cum Laude position. By American standards I would not have a high enough GPA to maintain funding if I was on scholarships.
I implore Maine residents to take caution on accepting a standardized system. Neither a percentile or letter system is perfect by a long shot, and both have serious downfalls. After experiencing both systems first hand, I would argue that adopting (or at least being open to) a more hollistic approach which gives vocational options for a student’s strengths as an integral part of a standard grading system is a better way forward. The real issue here is not semantics of letters or standards. The issue is the system is in need of reform, and it is a complex issue that deserves to be looked at from many different angles.