Posted on 01/08/2015 4:27:02 PM PST by detective
Dr. Sandra L. Stotsky, professor emerita at the University of Arkansas, recently said that Renaissance Learning’s latest report revealed that a large number of college freshman are reading at a seventh-grade level.
Stotsky, who received her Ed. D. from Harvard, is a well-known and respected figure in the world of education. She served on the Common Core Validation Committee in 2009-10 and, along with colleague James Milgram, professor of mathematics at Stanford University, refused to approve Common Core’s standards, which she called “inferior.”
In a recent interview with Breitbart Texas, Stotsky said:
We are spending billions of dollars trying to send students to college and maintain them there when, on average, they read at about the grade 6 or 7 level, according to Renaissance Learning’s latest report on what American students in grades 9-12 read, whether assigned or chosen.
(Excerpt) Read more at thenewamerican.com ...
I’ve been hiring technical college grads since the mid-eighties. I used to throw away resumes with poor grammar and spelling errors. After all, one must assume the resume is the applicant’s best effort.
If I did that now I wouldn’t have any resumes.
The degradation in basic reading and writing skills is disheartening. It seems young Americans can no longer read and write, and immigrants can’t be bothered to learn proper English.
Ugh.
For example, Black Beauty by Anna Sewell is considered 7th grade level, as is Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre. Poe ranks around 9th grade. Classics from Austen, Dickens, Eliot, Hardy, Shakespeare, Trollope, and Wharton are High school level, along with Mark Twain and Joseph Conrad. In other words, Old School writing.
Wonder how much it would be worth to have someone else homeschool your child, old school style. No common core, reading at the required level (like, before they dumbed it down) and plenty of socialization. A private school, so to speak.
And, did ya’ll know that most newspapers at written at the 7th grade level? Are you connecting the dots?
A couple of decades ago, Chicago Magazine carried a story about two sisters, who had graduated from high school on the South Side of Chicago.
They were #1 and #2 in their graduating class.
Both had their applications to Malcom X College rejected.
Malcom X College is a Jr. College on the South Side of Chicago.
The sisters were black. As was, probably, their high school population (and teachers).
The reason for the rejection was that their reading and comprehension skills were at the elementary school level.
I’m sure they would be accepted today. Maybe even to an Ivy League school.
The standards at their old high school (if it’s still there) are undoubted lower today.
They would have been accepted if they played football.
Partially in response to “No Child Left Behind” (which demanded accountability/results - the reason it was opposed so strongly by the teachers’ unions) and partially due to taxpayer pressure (due to the sky-high costs of public education), many schools now simply award inflated grades. Parents think their children are learning (because their grades indicate that), and here in NJ many parents scattered all over the state believe their school ditrict is one of the top districts in the state (”We’re all winners!”).
Any parent that assumes a school (public or private) is really teaching his/her child is foolish; here in NJ private schools had been better in the past but now will accommodate anyone who can pay the tuition. My children describe a class where you could raise your grade a full letter by bringing in a can for one of their food drives; that about sums up the value of grades...
That makes sense; the degree itself isn’t the issue - it is what the applicant can do for the company. This especially holds true if the applicant is a “preferred minority” - black, Hispanic, or female. They are awarded degrees automatically for their race/gender; they just need to fill out the paperwork.
Hubby taught computer science and electronics at JR College after his 20 yr hitch in the Navy teaching the same stuff.
ALL the Memphis City School A/B Math grads had to go through his REMEDIAL math class before he could teach the rest of his course. He retired 8 yrs ago and there has been NO improvement to the City Schools, in fact they dumbed them down more for the hispanics.
“They will reset the bar —”
The way SAT scores are calculated have already been reset once. I forget the name they used for it - a PC term to deflect what they were really doing.
“We need fewer people going to college not more. And better precollege education.”
Exactly.
However, our fascist ‘leader’ is now proposing free community college for all. I don’t see the story here on FR yet, but it’s on Drudge. I should learn how to post articles, I guess.
This is actually great news....7th graders are reading at college level!
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