This my response to a letter to the editor, as I wrote it. Save for corrected type-o's it's unedited. And of course, my real name appears on the orriginal. And the version as it appeared in the newspaper is directly below it.
This is in response to the letter from Carl Childress published Aug. 12. All I can say is "Gross Incompetence." Mr. Childress wanted to know by whom is grade inflation a well-known practice. Well, for one, the students. When I was going to school here in McAllen, I knew about teachers inflating grades. It's a more widespread problem than Mr. Childress wants to admit to anyone, including himself. Closing your eyes and ears to the problem isn't going to make it non-existent.
An example of grade inflation is the "No student will receive lower than 50 on the report card for the first six weeks of work." This says to students, (speaking from experience,) that if you just show up, whether you do anything or not, you'll get a grade. Doesn't matter what the grade is, all a lot of students want is just a grade. So I tried it, and sure enough, I got a 50 just for showing up. I refused to do anything because I personally prefer to earn a grade, rather than get one no matter what I do.
Perhaps if I had received what I had earned rather than 50 minimum, I wouldn't have walked out, angry at the teachers and the school. As it is, I'm still angry about the education I received. I refused to do work that I learned to do two grades earlier up north, so I was treated as a "discipline problem." Although, in most cases the teachers knew that I wasn't.
The idea that students who can't pass, or more likely won't pass, are "discipline problems," is just gross incompetence. I chose not to pass one single class, but I was anything but a "discipline problem." I kept my mouth shut and stayed out of the way. Oftentimes I even found myself a quiet little corner to read. The books I was reading were two and three, sometimes more levels above the required reading levels.
A few years ago there were teachers demanding better pay. I say that students should strike. For nothing less than a better education. Students should stand up right now, and not set foot in school again, until educational standards are improved. The students of today are America's future. Do you really want someone with a substandard education running the country someday? I know for a fact that in some schools students from higher income households are being treated extra special, in some cases even called "GT." Meanwhile, the real GT students are receiving less than adequate educations, merely because they are from lower income households. In most cases it's the students from higher income households that are the real trouble makers.
Being a teacher Mr. Childress gets a completely different view of things than any student. "Oh Boy, he's a teacher, he must know what he's talking about." WRONG! He's seeing things from the wrong side of the fence. The students have a much better idea of what's going on than teachers, especially those who care to pay attention to their surroundings. I've known students that know more about what's going on in the school hierarchy than the teachers. Merely because they don't close their eyes and ears to the outside world.
Mediocre Thought
McAllen
Thursday, August 14, 1997
Grade Inflation Draws Opposition
To the editor:
This is in response to the letter from Carl Childress published Aug. 12. Mr. Childress wanted to know by whom is grade inflation a well-known practice. Well, for one, the students.
When I was going to school here in McAllen, I knew about teachers inflating grades.
An example of grade inflation is the proposal that no student will receive lower than 50 on the report card for the first six weeks of work. This says to students (speaking from experience) that if you just show up, whether you do anything or not, you'll get a grade. Doesn't matter what the grade is, all a lot of students want is just a grade.
So I tried it, and sure enough, I got a 50 just for showing up.
Perhaps if I had received what I had earned rather than 50 minimum, I wouldn't have walked out, angry at the teachers and the school. As it is, I'm still angry about the education I received. I refused to do work that I learned to do two grades earlier up north, so I was treated as a "discipline problem." Although, in most cases the teachers knew that I wasn't.
The idea that students who can't pass, or more likely won't pass, are "discipline problems," is wrong. I chose not to pass one single class, but I was anything but a "discipline problem." I kept my mouth shut and stayed out of the way. Oftentimes I even found myself a quiet little corner to read. The books I was reading were two and three, sometimes more levels above the required reading levels.
A few years ago there were teachers demanding better pay. I say that students should strike. For nothing less than a better education. Students should stand up right now, and not set foot in school again, until educational standards are improved.
The students of today are America's future. Do you really want someone with a substandard education running the country someday? I know for a fact that in some schools students from higher income households are being treated extra special, in some cases even called "gifted and talented." Meanwhile, the real GT students are receiving less than adequate educations, merely because they are from lower income households. In most cases it's the students from higher income households that are the real trouble makers.
Being a teacher Mr. Childress gets a completely different view of things than any student. But he's seeing things from the wrong side of the fence. The students have a much better idea of what's going on than teachers, especially those who care to pay attention to their surroundings. I've known students that know more about what's going on in the school hierarchy than the teachers. Merely because they don't close their eyes and ears to the outside world.
Mediocre Thought
McAllen
via the Internet
