But at least you're not being racist, right?
WRONG! It's utterly racist.
Posted on 10/21/2023 1:01:01 PM PDT by hiho hiho
Oregon high school students won’t have to prove basic mastery of reading, writing or math to graduate from high school until at least 2029, the state Board of Education decided unanimously on Thursday, extending the pause on the controversial graduation requirement that began in 2020.
The vote went against the desires of dozens of Oregonians who submitted public comments insisting the standards should be reinstated, including former Republican gubernatorial candidate Christine Drazan. Backlash against the lowered standard had already delayed the vote, originally slated to take place in September.
Opponents argued that pausing the requirement devalues an Oregon diploma. Giving students with low academic skills extra instruction in writing and math, which most high schools did in response to the graduation rules, helped them, they have argued.
But leaders at the Oregon Department of Education and members of the state school board said requiring all students to pass one of several standardized tests or create an in-depth assignment their teacher judged as meeting state standards was a harmful hurdle for historically marginalized students, a misuse of state tests and did not translate to meaningful improvements in students’ post high school success.
Higher rates of students of color, students learning English as a second language and students with disabilities ended up having to take intensive senior-year writing and math classes to prove they deserved a diploma. That denied those students the opportunity to take an elective, despite the lack of evidence the extra academic work helped them in the workplace or at college, they said.
Board members underscored that state-mandated standardized tests will still be administered to most Oregon high school students – they just won’t be used to determine whether a student has the skills necessary to graduate.
“We haven’t suspended any sort of assessments,” state board member Vicky López Sánchez, a dean at Portland Community College, said during Thursday’s meeting. “The only thing we are suspending is the inappropriate use of how those assessments were being used. I think that really is in the best interest of Oregon students.”
Oregon lawmakers, however, have mandated that families be told each year that they can opt their student out of taking state tests – and one third of high school juniors didn’t take the tests last spring, meaning they and their families don’t necessarily know how they measure up against statewide academic standards.
Proving mastery of reading, writing and math on one of many standardized tests or a teacher-judged in-depth assignment was one of several Oregon graduation requirements. Students also have to earn a prescribed number of credits and complete an education plan that maps out how they can achieve post high-school goals.
During the pandemic, Gov. Kate Brown signed a bill freezing the proficiency requirement, as standardized tests weren’t happening amid school closures. Lawmakers decided to order a more comprehensive review of graduation requirements.
After broad outreach to families, educators, students and employers, with a particular focus on people of color, the Oregon Department of Education recommended new graduation recommendations about a year ago. One of those was to scrap the requirement to show mastery of reading, writing and math. State lawmakers have not acted on that recommendation, and the department in the meantime asked the state board to continue its pause through at least the 2027-28 school year.
Speaking of the academic mastery requirements, Dan Farley, assistant superintendent of research and data for the department, told the state board Thursday, “They did not work. What they were designed to do is protect student interests. We have no evidence that they did that.”
Farley pointed to a 2021 analysis by Oregon’s Higher Education Coordinating Commission that found no clear evidence that implementing the proficiency standards improved the performance of Oregon high school graduates during their first year of community college or university classes. The report did not study all possible postsecondary outcomes, Farley told the commission, and the state could do further research on that point.
The report also notes that it’s possible that the level of skill required to meet Oregon’s since-paused academic mastery standards was “too low to improve college and university outcomes.” It’s also possible, the report said, that student success in college relies more heavily on other factors than writing or math skill levels.
Suspending the requirement at least until the class of 2029 gives the state more time to do community outreach about how best to overhaul the grad standards, Farley said, and gives future high school students plenty of time to prepare if this standard does resume.
Hundreds of people submitted written comments to board members about the requirement for students to demonstrate academic mastery, the vast majority in favor of keeping it. Many of those critical emails used the same stock language.
Drazan, a former member of the Legislature, wrote that she had opposed the 2021 bill that suspended the requirement in the first place. Oregon doesn’t need to decrease standards, she wrote, but create and act on a concrete plan to increase students’ academic achievement.
“The board failed to discuss their responsibility for lagging academic achievement in our state. Instead they cast the blame on a tool used to measure a student’s ability to read, write and do math,” Drazan said in a news release sent after the vote. “It’s disappointing that these unelected bureaucrats decided to ignore public comment and continue down a path that neglects their responsibility to help students meet high standards.”
Whitney Grubbs, executive director for Foundations for a Better Oregon, a coalition of Oregon-based nonprofits that advocates for educational equity among other school reforms, wrote in public testimony that pausing or ending graduation requirements without proposing more effective and equitable alternatives “risks leading Oregonians to believe that our state is lowering expectations to artificially mask disparities” and reinforces false and prejudiced ideas that students’ demographics dictate their academic success.
“As Oregonians, we hold high expectations for students because we believe in the boundless potential of children,” Grubbs’ testimony said. “...We urge state leaders to articulate a plan for holding Oregon’s education system accountable for demonstrating whether and how it is supporting all students to meet graduation requirements.”
So the taxpayers are paying for warehousing.
The neo-marxist Left needs blacks on the reservation to justify their woke, fake-civil-rights agitation. Losing blacks would be like old-school Marxists losing factory workers.
Therefore, everything the Left does now is to keep blacks angry, culturally-adrift, and ignorant.
Insane and evil. Destroying an entire generation.
This is also for the drug cartels. Need hopeless ignorant criminal drug users.
Unless you count homeschooling.
That’s right.
Hi.
My guess is that there is too much estrogen in the water supply of Oregon.
5.56mm
What’s with the ‘far right dystopia’?
Democrats treat black people like pets. It’s now 2023 and they continue to say they can’t get ID. Unable to learn.
Tell us why they can’t? Democrat policies haven’t fixed anything? Can’t have it both ways.
Another question, where is the history of deep seated racism in Oregon, much less something still holding blacks back today, in what is now a left wing utopia?
Blacks are existential to the democrat party. The vote change by a very few will end the Democrat tyranny in the City States
But at least you're not being racist, right?
WRONG! It's utterly racist.
here in the state of Washington, the rat leftist governor picks animal rights idiots for the Wildlife commission, which is supposed to take the opinions of the sciencfic wildlife professionals as for setting hunting/fishing seasons, licenses, etc....
bad joke...
of course I use the term "vote" tongue in cheek....here in this state, the vote is absolute fraud.
I remember seeing basic math problems on the back of job applications 20 years ago. Today, I can imagine some short-answer and/or essay questions in an application. Or, for online applications, multiple choice questions with correct grammar and incorrect grammar as choices.
Here is one of the most important questions to include in any employment application.
3) Please select the correct form below:
A) DidinDoNuffen
B) DinDuNufin
C) DidnDoNofun
D) Dindu Nuffin
E) All of ubuv
F) NunufUbuv
Democrat way keeping as many possible, dumb and jobless!
That’s the racist part and they don’t even realize it!
And the color of the teachers doesn’t matter.
Teaching them they don’t need to work and welfare is available.
Never get anywhere but blame it on the other party, you
know the bad guys like Trump.
If the kids are not proficient in reading, they are not going to be learning much of anything else. This race card is a convenient way to cover up the failure of teachers and teaching methods, as well as students and their families. Besides, minority students are not the only ones failing. I saw a report on the Illinois schools that had about 10% proficiency levels on all subjects. Some of the failures were in majority white district in small downstate towns.
ignorance personified..... the dumbing down of America... future generations of ignorents.
Why does Oregon hate black children so much? Why do they refuse to teach them to read, write and reckon?
Do those morons realize what they are saying?
That blacks and other don’t have the intelligence to learn the same as the liberal whites do!
WOW!!
SOOOOOOOOOOO—Oregon politicians are DEFRAUDING the taxpayers of OREGON who pay for kids to get a decent basic education to make them employable at about age 18.
A kid shows a “diploma” to a company that is hiring that thinks the kid can at least-—WRITE ENGLISH-—SPEAK ENGLISH-—DO MATH & Carry on a conversation.
AMAZING.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.