In the Fall of 2019 I attended a regional meeting of a new initiative, an in depth dive into everything high school called Graduation Measures; I sat at a table with a high school superintendent, a teacher and few parents, we mused over whether this was the beginning of the end of Regents Examination. A few months later, COVD, a lengthy pause, a 65-member Blue Ribbon Commission appointed and meeting monthly without public scrutiny (what happened to the Open Meeting law?) and finally a preview of the recommendations, the formal presentation at due the June Regents meeting and probably a lengthy comment period and an adoption early next year.
In the mid nineties the Board of Regents after lengthy debate created the single diploma, the local diploma was phased out, and it took about a decade to fully phase in the single, Regents diploma. For decades New York State had dual diplomas, a Regents diploma, passing five Regents Examinations and the local diploma, passing Regents Competency Tests (RCT), tests at the middle school level. The pressure to phase out the RCT diploma came from the business community, high school graduates with an RCT diploma were not ready for the world of work.
Currently 87% of students graduate with a Regents diploma while only 80% of Black and Hispanic students graduate with a Regents diploma, over the years the state has provided a range of Multiple Graduation Pathways, Appeals, Safety Nets and a Superintendent Determination and the Regents Exams are far more thoughtful than in the past. Click here and take the January 2024 American History Regents Examination.
Getting back to Graduation Measures, the list of proposed areas for change looks like every member of the Blue Ribbon Commission (GRC) has their favorite included, it’s a mélange of ideas, of “proposed changes,” not a program, For example, adding a course in financial literacy, all seniors currently take a required course in Economics, the content hasn’t been changed in decades, the recommendations also call for a course in Civics, again, all student take a course, Participation of Government, the content unchanged in decades. Some school districts teach “Action Civics,” actually getting involved in a local issue, it is controversial: should we teach students how to bring about change … adding a stop light at a crossing, an additional crossing guard, etc. or, maybe running for office?
A few weeks before COVID I was facilitating a local principals meeting with a representative of the Census: how to teach about the Census and why it was important, I invited a leadership class from a local high school, one student appeared totally unengaged, I asked her why, she responded, “All those legislators are old white men, they don’t care about us.” The rest of the kids agreed, I asked her if she would run for office, I explained the Country Committee members run in election districts (ED), only encompasses a few blocks, she frowned, the other kids urged her to run, she reluctantly agreed, I sent her teacher the petition (only needs 25 signatures), COVID hit a few weeks later. Action Civics, getting engaged in actual struggles, issues or campaigns teaches kids about civics, is that what the Board of Regent wants? Adding a course is futile, teaching engaging content motivates students, I fear the Graduation Measures are icing on a tasteless cake.
Will its fate be the same as the Common Core?
The Graduation Measures presentation portrays the “Portrait of a Graduate,” I’m more interested in the “Portrait of a Non-Graduate.” If we can identify the obstacles and eliminate them we will empower the student.
The # 1 obstacle is chronic absenteeism, defined as absent 10% or more of school days. The data is overwhelming, kids who don’t go to school regularly don’t learn and chronic absenteeism begins in the early grades, escalates, test scores are poor and by the time the student is in middle school s/he begins to fail subjects and are overwhelmed by high school. New York City recently created a student specific data warehouse, attendance for every student is available at the end of each school day, every school has an attendance plan, an attendance team and every district an Attendance Compliance Coordinator, and the year old process has shown “modest gains,” this is not a magic bullet, for the governor and chancellor we’re going to teach phonics, all kids will learn to read, let’s move on. The causes of absenteeism are manifold, in-school and out-of-school issues, we should use Poverty Risk Load Indices, education swims in a complex world, the best indicator of reading and math scores are parental income and level of education. Dollars should be driven to the “truly disadvantaged,” not by free lunch forms.
The Board of Regents should be aggressively addressing the obstacles to teaching and learning, many of which go beyond the classroom.
State Education is beginning the process of creating a data warehouse, it’ll take a few years.
The goal of the Graduation Measures efforts, “Develop recommendations to the Board of Regents on what measures of learning and achievement could better serve New York’s diverse student population as indicators of what they know and of their readiness for college, career, and civic life.” The result is a hodge-podge, a long list, not an integrated actionable plan. Read plan here.
The world has changed since the Fall of 2019, the most significant “invention” of our lifetime is changing our lives, and there is no slowing the changes.
The tidal wave, the tsunami is AI (Artificial Intelligence), if you read anything read the following,
Control Click: https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgzGxTNtmNsQFkXgnzFBKkCVNJmJD
The question is not how we monitor, how we will control, the question is how we will adapt to an entirely new landscape that is changing daily. Teachers and students are already using AI, to write lesson plans, to research anything, to research and write school assignments. Yes, we have created an artificial brain, it learns, it thinks, it’s a world changing tool. You either learn to ride the wave or be swept under it, there is no in-between.
The very definition of teaching and learning are changing by the second, many of my contemporaries shrug, a fad, it’ll pass, and I suggest viewing an old film, The Ballad of Narayama https://archive.org/details/the-ballad-of-narayama-1983
Ed in the Apple: Blogging on the Intersection of Education and Politics Title 