By Kristin
I'm the short one in the photo. That's my boat at the Intercollegiate Rowing Association Regatta in 1993, my last year of college at the University of Washington. This picture wouldn't exist, and I wouldn't be a college graduate, if it hadn't been for someone at my high school who, without being asked by me or my parents to do so, put me in honors classes and on a college track.
SB 5243 does what some mysterious educator did for me in 1984; it requires that schools automatically place a capable student in academically accelerated classes. What a beautiful policy.
After I was expelled from a private school in ninth grade for being a behavior problem and an academic failure, I found myself totally out of my element at my local public school – Mission Bay High School.
Three weeks into my tenth grade year I was handed a new schedule, so I did what most kids do and went to my new classes without asking for an explanation. They were harder. Kids were better behaved. Later I learned I'd been put in honors classes. I do not know by whom, and I do not know why. Certainly not because of my transcript, which was full of Cs and Ds and negative comments about a failure to reach potential. Certainly not by intelligent and enthusiastic participation in class; I was so shellshocked I don't think I said one word until December.
Now that I'm a teacher, I know that a teacher or counselor said something like, "Kristin should be in honors classes," and it happened. I got a new schedule. And I, who had been frequently suspended and on chronic academic probation in junior high, ended up graduating with academic distinction and college credit for both American Literature and Political Science courses. I had both the education and the transcript to go to college, and I did, but only because someone put me on the right track without asking for permission.
My parents might have enrolled me in college-prep classes, but they didn't know much about the San Diego Public Schools and, frankly, they temporarily washed their hands of my education after the tragedy of my junior high years. But I wasn't totally on my own, a smart 14-year old with a bad record, because someone at Mission Bay was looking out for me. Every child deserves that of our education system. Problem children deserve it especially.
So let me recap what this policy looks like from someone who lived it: I went from being someone who was thrown away because of a failure to reach my potential to someone who was put in college-prep classes because I had potential. Isn't that the kind of shift in opportunity great policy can create?
Senate Bill 5243 requires that districts "automatically enroll any student who meets the state standard on the high school statewide student assessment or meets a district-approved minimum threshold score on the PSAT in the next most rigorous level of advanced courses offered by the high school."
It's not about behavior, personal motivation, engaged parents or the ability to complete homework. It is about academic potential, and it forces schools to acknowledge that many students have it who don't have academically involved parents or the ability, confidence or ambition to fight for their own education.
I love this bill. I know it is the right thing to do.
Maren, great points. This bill allows parents the ability to opt their children out of the class, and I’m assuming a sophomore who didn’t want to do honors work would be able to get the opt out paperwork home and completed. Also, the bill requires schools inform parents about this opt-out option. Really, no child who doesn’t want to be in an higher-level class has to be. They are just automatically enrolled. I see it as a way around the barrier imposed by parents who aren’t system-savvy about getting their child in the best classes.
I’m also a big fan of CTE classes, but there is nothing in this bill that denies a child the opportunity to take those classes if that’s what he or she is interested in pursuing. And there’s nothing in it that’s going to drain resources from any other worthy department.
Right now, those expensive AP Biology text books are going to kids whose parents made all the right choices for their child. Now, a few kids who don’t have that advantage will get an expensive text book. I’m okay with that.
Many schools have some truly outstanding CTE and other elective courses available. These courses often are great choices for students. Automatically enrolling students in the next most advanced academic class may not actually be the best option for some students–many times the CTE and other elective classes really are a good option, not something that is “less” in any way than an advanced academic class.
Also, classes like AP biology are very expensive to teach–college level text books and the associated lab materials do not come cheap. If enrollment in these courses suddenly increases, will schools be prepared to handle the extra cost? To handle an influx of students in these courses, will funds be diverted from existing CTE and other elective courses, thus weakening these important programs? Full funding of schools is clearly one of the main issues in this legislative session, and is especially important for this bill.
You’re both totally right.
Teachers will need to teach content, but also coach behavior and habits. The worst behavior, lousiest attitude and laziest work habits I’ve ever seen was from spoiled white honors boys with highly educated and doting parents. No contest. One mom even bullied every teacher to improve her son’s grades when he was a senior who clearly wasn’t going to get into the college of his choice.
Teachers have been putting up with kids in honors classes who lacked skills, good habits, and motivation for years. But it’s a racist system, because turn that poorly skilled, unmotivated and misbehaved student into an African American boy and suddenly the learning environment of other kids is threatened. We need to recognize that there have been entitled slackers in advanced classes for years. Teachers have offered help during lunch, nagged about homework, allowed late work, and made allowances when no work got done because mom had cancer because they knew the student deserved a future even if the essay didn’t get turned in.
It will be a shift to deal with a disadvantaged slacker in an honors class, but I know great teachers will find a way to make it work. And there’s money for training written into the bill. Maybe a good PD would be, “The lazy AP student who lacks a helicopter mom- how to grade?”
You’re right. I do fear micromanaging, but I also fear blanket policies that do not consider the individual.
We have AVID classes and intervention periods (which partially act as extra study time for kids), and since we have implemented these we have seen a huge uptick in diversity in our upper level classes. However, we also had to allow students to turn down an upper level class because kids can’t always handle 4, 5, or 6 advanced courses; plus, some kids just want to focus their studies in an area.
Besides this, no test can measure work ethic. Industriousness seems to have more impact on advanced course success than many other factors, not all but many factors.
I teach in a high school of about 2000 students. We don’t have honors classes, just standard and AP. To me, AP is enough of a leap in terms of workload that cognitive potential is not enough if it isn’t supported by study habits and the disposition toward doing the work that is expected. I’m not saying that students should not have the opportunity to be “moved up,” but that we also need to realize that there are other significant factors that schools need to be prepared to support. I have colleagues who teach AP courses who talk often about the brilliant kid who never does any work… and in some cases, that kid will not earn course credit, not be on track to graduate. The potential for this kind of scenario is not a reason for opposing this bill, but it certainly demands that we consider the expectations of “the next level.” In my building, “the next level” means that a learner must be independent, not necessarily more intelligent… they must be able to read the books and write the papers outside of class, then discuss and refine in class. I don’t know what the solution is… (maybe in part: bring back study hall) …but I do think that when we push kids forward we need to make sure we’re not just pushing them into waters they are not prepared to navigate alone.
drpezz, it seems like you fear more micromanagement from Olympia. I understand that. At the same time, when I look at the demographic of kids who manage to get a seat in honors or AP or IB classes, I can’t help but think there’s something that exists in the enrollment system that is a barrier to equal access. To say that there isn’t a barrier is to allow the assumption that White and Asian kids are better students. None of us would say that, but when White and Asian kids get into honors classes because their parents demand it, and no one makes the same demands for other capable kids, we’re silent participants in maintaining that barrier. All this bill does is insist that a student who is at standard is given a seat in an honors class. I know there will be teachers who take that challenge as a gift, and I know there are teachers who will resent it. I know not every child will rise to the occasion, but more kids will have the opportunity than would have under the old system.
Tom, I think I need some clarity. I think you are saying that if the at-standard students are moved to honors, the general ed classes will be even less academic. My prediction is that they won’t change that much. Right now I’m teaching 100% of kids who are below standard, and it’s not a zoo. We even do pretty intense work. I think the material and the management are more about who’s teaching those gen ed classes than the kids who fill the seats. Kids are kids, and a 4 on the HSPE doesn’t guarantee a better behaved or motivated student, in my experience.
On the other hand…
What happens to the students who aren’t placed in the advanced classes?
In the elementary grades we work very hard to “balance” classes, making sure every classroom has its fair share of motivated students and unmotivated students (along with girls, boys, ELLs, IEP’s, etc)
But when they hit middle school, balance goes out the window and students self-select their way out of “balanced classes.” This is wonderful for the honors students and the AP students and the IB students, but not so wonderful for the regular students.
I know this because I have two sons. One is honors, AP, IB all the way. One isn’t. And it’s as though they’re going to two different schools, which might as well be true. Our older son is surrounded by motivated, college bound go-getters. Our younger son is surrounded by kids who aren’t.
So again, this bill is great for kids like my older son, but for kids who struggle in school, it seems like it might serve to only widen the achievement gap.
Dang. That should have read “all too common.”
The precedents being set by the Legislature scares me. It’s this now. What’s next?
Anyway, the state assessment piece seems worse to me than the PSAT since (at least in my school) the state test is below the current mainstream class and is not even close to the honors courses.
It should be, drpezz, you’re right, but it’s not. Few districts and few schools are doing this for kids.
I like the idea behind the bill and the impact it could have. But, I hate the bill. It micromanages districts which is becoming all to common. Now the Legislature is going to determine the scheduling process at schools? Too intrusive.
In my mind, the intent is positive, but this should be a district leadership and school board decision.