Re: State Board Votes Down Exit Exam Options

[Scott Hays <shays@ccwebster.net>]

On Mar 11, 2006, at 3:21 AM, aburke5054@aol.com wrote:

> ... If you let kids play with loaded guns, life will sort
> them out also.  I really don't think that is a good argument for
> letting kids play with loaded guns.  The average African-American
> senior is achieving at the level of the average White eighth-grader  
> and
> you're still whistling your tunes against the Governor, the Board, the
> Business Roundtable, whoever.  Knock, knock, reality calling Hays.
>
> Art

(1) When I was seven years old, my neighbor and best friend showed us  
this cool rifle that his older brother owned (it was an 1850s Sharps  
muzzle loading buffalo gun).  He then took a "dead" .45 caliber  
bullet and rammed it down the barrel with the ramrod.  The rifle  
exploded in his hand, and tore through my shoulder and wrist.   
"Playing with loaded" guns is a tragic experience that I know about  
directly, Art.  While I survived, I would say that life has sorted  
out the accident.  I didn't say that life sorts "fairly" or  
"happily" ... it just does sorts things out, and we attach our  
judgments about the process.  That process involves a mixture of  
circumstances (some we control, some we don't) that involve the cards  
you are dealt and the way you play them.

I am not overly fond of guns, but am wise enough to know that it is  
the bullets that do the damage.  Should the state protect me from all  
possible sources of harm?  I don't think so.  Is protecting me from  
loaded guns the same as protecting from a "bad" education?  Probably  
not.  Is there a gap between what is offered to white suburban middle  
and upper-class kids and what is offered to minority and inner-city  
kids?  You bet.  If an Exit Exam applies pressure on those providing  
resources to do so in a more equitable and magnanimous way (i.e., all  
schools have access to the same resources that the best schools have,  
all schools have access to the resources they need to do the best  
possible job), then I would be one of the first to say, "Go for it".   
It doesn't.  Maybe that is its purpose, but the Governor and the  
State Board (I did not mention the Business Round Table, nor have I  
ever referred to it in any of my posts) are NOT providing those  
resources.  In fact, they are doing the opposite ... they are using  
the test as a stick to punish students and schools, and to prod them  
into doing better with *less* resources.  The same with NCLB, now  
that I think of it ... NCLB provides resources only if you do better  
with what you already have (it sustains the "already have" business),  
but it does not provide *additional* resources to do better (in fact,  
it withholds resources if you don't do well enough).  Since it also  
makes no effort to address the other issues that people on this list  
repeatedly spell out for you, Art, I guess there is just a blinder  
that you are wearing that does not enable you to see the inherent  
contradiction in the current "reform" movement.

Finally ... the Governor (and most of his predecessors ...  
specifically Davis, Wilson, Deukmajian and Reagan) have been direct  
obstacles to eliminating the achievement gap, no matter what lip  
service they may have given to making it go away.  They do so both  
directly and indirectly.  That is why I speak specifically of "the  
governor" or ... as you say ... "whistling my tunes" against him.   
The State Board, incidentally ... especially in the last decade ...  
has also been very instrumental in assuming direct control over  
policies.  Whether you agree with its policies or not is immaterial  
(obviously, I disagree with them), because it has taken a hard-core  
position of allowing NO deviation from its dictates and decisions.   
There is absolutely no flexibility allowed in terms of local, bottom- 
up decision-making.  Even if it is correct in its assumptions and its  
policies (which, again, in my opinion it is not), it not only thinks  
it can drag everyone (friends, foes, apathetic weasels) down this  
road with it, but it actually exercises its power to try to do so.

This is NOT the way you implement effective change.  People do not  
like being told what to do, and many of them resist.

Back to the governor(s).  What separates them ... all of the ones I  
listed, above ... from his "zaniness" Jerry Brown (the moon  
governor), is that they think and operate as if they must be in  
*control* of whatever programs and policies that they (that is, their  
"spokespersons" ... i.e., "experts" they hire who have a "plan", but  
who seldom have any direct classroom experience to guide them) impose  
upon the hapless students of the state (and their teachers and  
administrators).  Power and authority flows from the top, down.   
Period.  On the other hand, and despite whatever weaknesses and  
shortcomings he may have had, Governor Brown trusted the people  
around him, and empowered them to make decisions and design  
programs.  He allowed the ideas to flow the other direction, as well  
(from the bottom, up).

Now, if we can get the decision-making going *both* directions AND  
provide the resources in an equitable manner, then we might see some  
progress being made in terms of achievement.  We can then measure  
that achievement in a more equitable manner, as well -- we can use  
multiple measures, not just one-shot snapshots (that may have been  
taken on a bad day) of a certain type of performance