Necessity, the Mother of Invention

I am recovering nicely from my injuries, even though my side still hurts. I can’t sleep while laying down in any position for more than an hour or two before the pain wakes me up. I spend most of the night in a recliner in the bedroom.
This is the week of parent/teacher conferences and I have twenty two scheduled as of last Friday. I should schedule a few more next week, but that is only a fraction of the 137 students I teach. As usual most of my appointments are with the parents of excellent students. They only want to meet so I can tell them how wonderful their kids are. The few problem students I have—mostly low grades—have not bothered to schedule a meeting. This is the way it always goes. Right now my appointments are scheduled Thursday between 12:30 and 7:30 pm at 10 minute intervals with a three hour gap between 3:00 and 6:00. Thankfully we have Friday off.
In what must have been a shocking newspaper story—at least to everyone not involved in education—the Chicago Tribune exposed the practice of falsifying test scores in public schools to avoid looking bad. The article, Case of the Missing Juniors, (Nov. 1, 2009), appeared on the front page and outlines how Rich East High School in suburban Chicago managed to make it look like their mandated state test scores had increased by more than 30% in one year. The naive people at the state board of education assumed the administration and staff of the school had discovered some new and highly effective way of educating students and wanted the district to run in-service for other schools. It was then discovered that the school had accomplished this incredible feat by simply redefining what a junior was, eliminating their lowest 40% (academically) from being tested. While the administration at Rich East High School got caught with their hand in the cookie jar, the Tribune reported that across the state about 20% of the sophomore class disappeared from 2007 to 2008. These “missing juniors” reappeared again as seniors after another year; and yes you guessed it, seniors are not officially tested.
Maybe schools should pre-test students and redefine a junior as only those who already score high enough to pass the state tests. This would result in a 100% success rate, and prove just how effective our public schools are, and how effectively our tax dollars are being spent.