Some Baltimore City Schools Now Passing All Students Who Attend Regularly

Yup, some Baltimore City Schools are passing all students with regular attendance, regardless of their academic achievement. I found this out today from a Baltimore City School teacher, so I know it's not a rumor. I'm going to find Dr.Alonso's address and send him a letter, letting him know of my passionate disapproval.

For those who don't know, I teach developmental (remedial) writing to community college students. Basically, I teach middle school level English to people with high school diplomas who somehow made it through high school without learning how to write. Here is a sample from an essay a student recently submitted. This student is not going to pass my class and came to me crying, hoping I would have sympathy. Students are conditioned that they can pass if they just present their sad story to the teacher, but that just doesn't cut it in college. Here's the writing I received:

"To receive information on how the prison system operate. Many teens have seen prison stories on TV however they have not lived them. Another way to try and rehabilitate the young teens is to allow them weekends inside of the prisons to see the daily life of a convict. Begin able to witness how their life can change for begins a ward of the state."

This is what happens when students do not receive a proper education. How can students possibly receive a proper education when grades do not matter and everyone passes? How does this benefit the student? Adults have the responsibility to be straight with kids, to tell it like it is. Kids need to be told that their skills are below-level and they need to know what to do to improve. Teachers do a great disservice by passing students along.

I have students come to me with letters they have written to the police department to complain of unnecessary verbal abuse and letters they have written to the court system. They want me to see if I can understand what they are trying to say so that their letters will be read rather than laughed at and thrown away. People can't write letters and they can't read contracts. How are we giving our students a chance at life by just passing them through? I think that's the most terrible thing we can do to youth. If they do decide to one day go to college, they'll have to suffer through the shock of realizing that they are way behind where they actually need to be in order to be admitted into credit bearing classes. I know because I teach these students that the system has failed.

City Kids Facing Forever Expulsion for Setting Fires

I just read an article written by the Baltimore Sun:

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/education/bal-md.expulsions19may19,0,2683888.story

Students who have been expelled for setting fires in Baltimore City Schools "may appeal to the city school board and after that the state board of education, but if the expulsions are upheld, they are never to return to a Baltimore public school."

"The school system will cut off home tutoring and alternative school placements for those students in June, and then parents' options will be limited to home-schooling their children or sending them to private schools."

These stricter rules seem to be making a difference, and the article states that "the number of arsons in city schools has dropped sharply, from 80 last academic year to 47 so far in the school year about to end."

"Before this year in Baltimore and typically in surrounding school systems, students who engage in violent behavior such as arson are expelled, but they can attend an alternative school or complete work at home, and eventually they are permitted to return."

I think permanently expelling students for setting fires in schools is an excellent idea. By enforcing severe consequences, students will get the message. Otherwise, they won't. Shifting a student from one school to another doesn't get the message across. Students (and parents) need to be dealt serious, permanent consequences when seriously dangerous acts are committed. If a student sets a fire at school, he or she has no business being in school. Maybe the punishment will be a wake-up call for the student; maybe it will be a wake-up call for the parents.

If staff sends a clear, concrete message that violent acts will not be tolerated, the students and parents will get the message. If a student doesn't have to go to school anymore and is assigned a private tutor to come to the house, and then is able to get his or her HS diploma, then what have they learned? Who cares if I make brazenly stupid mistakes...the school system will cater to me anyway.

If the school system has to permanently black list certain students, then so be it. Baltimore City Schools are in dire need of change; and I'm all for drastic change.

I guess those kids that have set fires in school will have to take their own initiative if they wish to be educated. I think that is fair. We can't always feel sorry for the people who are jeopardizing the safety of others. Kids know the difference between right and wrong, and they definitely know that setting a fire in school is a terrible thing to do. Education should be seen as a privilege; not as a joke.

Obama's Education Agenda

If anyone's interested in Obama's agenda for education, check out this site:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/education/

Sense of community: Let the students decorate

I know my ideas have many kinks that need to be worked out, but I feel I am taking a step in the right direction by brainstorming. My last post was about students eating lunch in classrooms rather than a cafeteria, which probably can't possibly happen for a long time for a vast variety of reasons. I am still going to work on making the idea more realistic and I still firmly believe that all hallway traffic needs to be synchronized, meaning that there is never a time during the day when some students are changing locations while others are sitting in a classroom, involved in an academic period.

Another idea I came up with, which is much easier to integrate into the school system as we know it today, has to do with the decoration of the actual classroom. In my experience, I have always observed that each classroom is decorated according to the lead teacher's preferences. This sets the stage right away that the room belongs to the teacher and it allows the students to separate themselves and be alienated from their surroundings.

Here is what I propose:

Each classroom should have a homeroom. At the beginning of the year, that homeroom should be given the task to come up with a plan on how to aesthetically decorate the room. The teacher will have to mediate to make sure that all students are allowed to be involved in decisions and that the decisions made are school-appropriate. This will allow the students to practice teamwork, which is a job-skill/life-skill that they definitely will need to utilize in their future. This will also make them feel more connected to the classroom.

I think one of the main problems with school is that there is a disconnect. If the students are made more a part of things, they will come to take more pride in the school and will come to think that their contributions are valuable. I know the teachers are there to help students grow and intervene when necessary, but I don't think they need to 100% run the show. I know teachers find it refreshing to paste up those finely-crated posters, but give it a break and let the student's come up with something that reflects their own originality.

Eliminating Bells...Which Leads To Another of My Ideas: Getting Rid of Cafeteria Seating!

Schools should do away with cafeteria seating and students should eat in the classrooms. This seems inconvenient, but I'm pretty sure it would be very beneficial to students. One reason I say this is because lower-functioning students often do not have appropriate social skills. Violence and gang activity are more prevalent in lower-income neighborhoods. Violence is much more likely to occur when students are in large groups and staff supervision is limited. Eating lunch in the classroom will increase the level of safety for students and staff. It will also help to synchronize the daily schedule.

I know this is easier said than done because now we have to figure out a way to get the lunch from the cafeteria to the students. I have thought up a solution to this. Get the students involved. Let several students from each class take on the responsibility of bringing the classroom lunch from the cafeteria. They can take student orders and be responsible for retrieving the meals. This can be considered job-skill training. Giving responsibility to the students will increase their confidence and self-worth.

It's just an idea, and it may be impossible, but for now it sounds good. Thoughts on this?

Second Issue: Asynchronous Bells

My main overall goal is to lessen the amount of chaos that is present in urban school systems. The first way to do that, which I described in a previous post, is to cap each classroom to a max of 20 students. The second way to do that is to eliminate bells.

Visualize this scenario. It's the middle of the day, I'm teaching an 11th grade English class at a not-so-great public high school, and a bell rings. This bell is not for my students. It is for different students and it is signaling that it is time for them to go to lunch. My class now completely loses concentration as they watch their friends walking by, heading off to social time. Suddenly my students decide that this is the time when they urgently need to use the restroom. They cannot refrain from poking their heads into the hallway to say something to their friends or siblings. I cannot fully regain control of the classroom until the halls have cleared.

Having bells ringing asynchronously is detrimental to student learning, as it presents an unnecessary disturbance. If every bell sounded in the school throughout the day was meant for every student, this would lessen the chaos. I'll take it a step further and propose that bells be eliminated completely. It would take some creativity to pull this off, but I have some recommendations that I will suggest in my next blog to make this idea work.

Cities in Crisis

I found an interesting report on America's graduation rates. It focuses on the most populous cities in the country. It is called Cities in Crisis and is published by America's Promise Alliance. Page 10 gives a chart of the graduation rates for school districts serving the nation's 50 largest cities. The report was recently published and the web address is:
http://www.americaspromise.org/uploadedFiles/AmericasPromiseAlliance/Dropout_Crisis/SWANSONCitiesInCrisis040108.pdf
It shows that there is a pretty huge disparity between the cities and their surrounding metropolitan area. Detroit City School District comes in last with a 24.9% graduation rate. Baltimore City doesn't fare all that much better, with a 34.6% graduation rate. The chart on page 12 of the report shows that the suburban districts of Baltimore have an 81.5% graduation rate. How is it that 34.6% of city kids are successfully graduating while 81.5% of county kids are graduating? We have to figure out a way to do better!