麻豆影视

In November, NPR uncovered in Washington, D.C., where half the graduates missed more than 90 days of school. Administrators pressured teachers to pass failing students, including those whom teachers had barely seen.

Policy wonks have had a field day with the report, adding graduation scandals to their lists of top 2018 education stories to watch and .

The one group of people who were not surprised by the scandal: .

George W. Bush once claimed that as president, he would challenge the 鈥渟oft bigotry of low expectations鈥� in our nation鈥檚 classrooms by raising the K-12 education standards for of all America鈥檚 children. But in the past two decades, the soft bigotry of low expectations hasn鈥檛 been challenged; it鈥檚 been masked by grade and graduation inflation. And these low expectations are not isolated in our nation鈥檚 most impoverished schools.

Four years ago, when I began my teacher training, a tenured teacher gave me some advice: 鈥淛ust give them a D; it鈥檒l be so much extra work for you to fail anyone.鈥� At the time, I thought it was strange wisdom, but soon I learned that it鈥檚 part of the 鈥渃ommon sense鈥� of survival in the world of teachers.

I worked in Fairfax County Public Schools, a more affluent, higher-performing district near Washington, where pressure to inflate grades and ensure students pass was ingrained. These district-encouraged, sometimes administrator-enforced grading policies still make me cringe.

, teachers are:

• Discouraged from having 鈥渉ard鈥� deadlines or assigning penalties for late work

• Discouraged from giving a student less than 50 percent on an assignment (regardless of the quality of work or level of completion)

• Encouraged to allow retakes to on all major assignments if a student earns less than an 80

Not only do these policies create extra work for already overworked teachers, they also promote an attitude of low expectations that does a disservice to our students in the long run. They teach students that deadlines aren鈥檛 important, that you can receive half the credit for none of the work, that achievement is detached from practice, and that you can always bank on a second chance.

The justification behind these policies is that a student鈥檚 final grade reflects his ultimate mastery of skills or content knowledge, uninfluenced by earlier academic struggles or behavioral issues.

I could almost believe in this educational philosophy, if it weren鈥檛 for .

Usually, a student鈥檚 final grade is the average of the previous quarters鈥� marks. When a student is at risk of failing, a teacher must determine if the student passes on quality points. On a 4.0 scale, an A is worth 4 points, a B is 3, a C is 2, a D is 1, and an F is 0. The teacher takes the total number of quality points the student earned for the year and divides it by 4 (the number of quarters) to determine whether the student passes. Simply, if a student scored an A in the first quarter (4 quality points), but failed the next 3 (0 quality points), the teacher divides 4 points by 4 quarters so the student receives 1 quality point for the year; she passes with a D.

You can read about the math . To me, passing while failing three-fourths of the year doesn鈥檛 align with a 鈥済rading for mastery鈥� philosophy.

The central office pressures schools to embrace policies like these, and administrators pressure teachers to do the same, even if the grades go against a teacher鈥檚 professional judgment. Ironically, the grading also state: 鈥淎ll grades reflect the teacher鈥檚 professional judgment of student achievement. Teachers are responsible for justifying their grades whenever the need exists.鈥�

Grading policies like these are not unique to Fairfax County. have begun to impose similar policies on teachers.

In my experience, being complicit in this system eventually weighs on you. Teachers know it鈥檚 unethical, and they know that the students will suffer the consequences when they leave high school misinformed about their abilities and unprepared for college and the workforce. I can only imagine that the felt similarly.

No teacher wants students to fail. I didn鈥檛, but I also believed students could reach my expectations and, more important, exceed their own, if they were held to certain criteria and received help along the way. Weakening expectations for behavior and academic achievement was not the way I had envisioned 鈥渉elping鈥� students when I decided to become a teacher.

Working in a system that discouraged having expectations demoralized me, and I think it disadvantaged my students. Different kids need different types of assistance, but creating a uniform policy of low expectations hurts the majority of students. Having never experienced it, students do not know how to cope with, and learn from, failure. Moreover, they have little incentive to grow academically when A鈥檚 aren鈥檛 earned through thinking, learning, and persevering, but are instead handed out like participation stickers.

In Virginia, students have to pass a standardized assessment to graduate from high school. That assessment is set at an eighth-grade level. The bar is low, but at least it exists. . Ballou High School graduated the majority of its students on D.C.鈥檚 standardized exams. Again, such inconsistencies aren鈥檛 news; .

We are becoming a society where students no longer earn diplomas; they receive them. When state lawmakers attempt , they鈥檙e lambasted until they relent and weaken the criteria.

As a nation, we鈥檙e afraid. Administrators, educators, parents, school board members, and other elected officials fear that if we raise the bar, our students won鈥檛 be able to reach it. We鈥檙e afraid that our kids will fail, so, instead, we fail them by sending them off to college and the workforce, knowing that they鈥檙e underprepared.

罢丑别测鈥檙别 for our complicity in a system that perpetuates low expectations.

A former English teacher, Emily Langhorne is an education policy analyst and project manager with the Progressive Policy Institute.

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