High School Graduation Requirements Updated--Keystone Exams 2.0

"The problem you've got is districts aren't doing as well as they might in getting kids educated well. If you suddenly implement high-stakes exams and kids can't graduate, you're penalizing the kids for the failures of the school system,"

Dr. Alan Lesgold, dean of the University of Pittsburgh School of Education

There's an ongoing dialogue/debate about high school graduation requirements between the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE), Governor Edward Rendell's office, the Congressional Senators/Representatives who serve on respective Education Committees, the union organizations for both teachers and school board members, and member organizations of the recently formed organization called The Coalition for Effective and Responsive Testing (CERT) comprised of several organizations including the Parent Teacher Association and the Pennsylvania NAACP.

Should students be required to prove a level of proficiency in mathematics, reading, writing, science, and social studies before being granted a "meaningful" high school diploma?

The agency argument goes something like this...the costs for testing and remediation would be in the millions and a tremendous burden to school districts particularly in a national recession, not to mention the pressure on teachers to actually ensure that beginning with the graduation class of 2015 students are educated when the Keystone Exam 1.0 kicks into effect that year subsequent to the failed or successful No Child Left Behind goal of educating most of America's students to a level of proficiency in mathematics, reading, writing, and science. Of course, students who fall below proficiency in any of those core content courses would risk failing to graduate from high school and all the consequences that come with it unless they have been identified by a learning disability (like being below proficient in reading or math) and receive academic support through "special education" services.

In early March 2009, several government agencies and organizations morphed the so called Graduation Competency Assessments into the Keystone Exams, which were variations on the theme of state-mandated assessments high schoolers would be required to pass in order to graduate with a regular high school diploma (others could graduate below proficiency with a special education diploma).

Further morphing involves the evolution of the Keystone 1.0 into the Keystone 2.0, which was crafted and agreed upon by CERT members. The Keystone 2.0 shifts from accountability to being not more than a Pennsylvania Department of Education created final course exam minus the exorbitant expenses to school districts or the burden to hold anyone responsible for academic success and ensuring that high school students graduate educated and prepared for the rigors of college, a career or the workforce. In effect, the Keystone Exams would not be a high-stakes exit exam and passing them would not be a state graduation requirement since PDE would create an exam that students would take at the end of a course and would count for 20% of their final grade.

“We appreciate that the coalition has kept the dialogue open concerning the need for these high-stakes exams. However, at a time when our state is facing a $2.6 billion and growing deficit, we believe there is no need for these additional, costly tests. The last thing that we need in this budget is new spending."

Joint Statement from Senator Orie and Rep. Saylor On Alternative Graduation Tests - aka Keystone Exams 2.0 Wednesday April 22, 2009

Whew...that took the steam out of that effort to require high school graduation competency exams in Pennsylvania. Powerful lobbyists!

The CERT group includes:

American Federation of Teachers--PA, Pennsylvania Association of Career and Technical Administrators, Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators, Pennsylvania Association of Elementary and Secondary School Principals, Pennsylvania Association of Pupil Service Administrators (special education), Pennsylvania Middle School Association, Pennsylvanias for the Educaton of Gifted Students, Pennsylvania State Education Association, Pennsylvania PTA (No PTA where I live), Pennsylvania NAACP (hmmm, wonder who they spoke with?)

"I applaud PSEA's willingness to join this discussion and look forward to studying the proposal. I worry deeply about the implications of one aspect of their plan. When you cap the weight of the Keystone final exam at no more than 20 percent of a student's grade, you lose the assurance that any student in any school is actually able to show they are meeting high school academic standards in English, math, science or social studies."

Chief among proponents of the Keystone Exam 1.0 version, state Education Secretary Gerald Zahorchak

Stay tuned. They're not done yet!

Children and TV: Limiting your child's screen time

Children and TV often go hand in hand. Understand the effects of too much screen time — and how to enforce reasonable limits.

By Mayo Clinic staff
Are you concerned about how much time your child spends watching TV or playing video games? Although some screen time can be educational, it's easy to go overboard. Consider this guide to children and TV, including how to limit your child's screen time.
Children and TV — the effects
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends limiting a child's use of TV, movies, video and computer games to no more than one or two hours a day. Too much screen time has been linked to:
Obesity. Children who watch more than two hours of TV a day are more likely to be overweight.
Irregular sleep. The more TV children watch, the more likely they are to resist going to bed and to have trouble falling asleep.
Behavioral problems. Children who watch excessive amounts of TV are more likely to bully, have attention problems, and show signs of depression or anxiety than children who don't.
Impaired academic performance. Elementary students who have TVs in their bedrooms tend to perform worse on tests than those who don't.
Less time for play. Excessive screen time leaves less time for active, creative play.
How to limit screen time
Your child's total daily screen time may be greater than you realize. Start monitoring it. In the meantime, you can take simple steps to reduce the amount of time your child spends watching TV, movies and videos or playing video or computer games:
Eliminate background TV. If the TV is turned on — even if it's just in the background — it's likely to draw your child's attention. If you're not actively watching a show, turn off the TV.
Keep TVs and computers out of the bedroom. Children who have TVs in their bedrooms watch more TV and videos than children who don't. Monitor your child's screen time and the Web sites he or she is visiting by keeping computers in a common area in your house.
Don't eat in front of the TV. Allowing your child to eat or snack in front of the TV increases his or her screen time. The habit also encourages mindless munching, which can lead to weight gain.
Set school day rules. Most children have limited free time during the school week. Don't let your child spend all of it in front of a screen.
Suggest other activities. Rather than relying on screen time for entertainment, help your child find other things to do. Consider classic activities, such as reading, playing a sport or trying a new board game.
Set a good example. Be a good role model. Limit your own screen time.
Become an active participant
When your child has screen time, make it as engaging as possible:
Plan what your child watches. Instead of flipping through channels, seek quality videos or use a program guide to select appropriate shows. Pay attention to TV Parental Guidelines — a system that rates programs based on suitability for children. When the program ends, turn off the TV.
Watch with your child. Whenever possible, watch programs together — and talk about what you see.
Choose video games that encourage physical activity. Better yet, make the games a family experience.
It may be difficult to start limiting your child's screen time, especially if your child already has a TV in his or her bedroom or your family eats dinner in front of the TV. But by creating new household rules and steadily making small changes in your child's routine, you can make a difference.

Source: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/children-and-tv/MY00522

Dismantle the Cradle to Prison (from schools) Pipeline

Join Marian Wright Edelman, President of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF), in the campaign to dismantle The Cradle to Prison Pipeline. CDF has become the nation's strongest voice for children and families. This campaign is a national and community crusade to engage families, youth, community leaders and institutions and those in power in every sector in the development of healthy, educated children. The Campaign advances policies that put children on track to productive adulthood and opposes those that criminalize children at younger and younger ages.

Nationally, 1 in 3 Black and 1 in 6 Latino boys born in 2001 are at risk of imprisonment during their lifetime. While boys are five times as likely to be incarcerated as girls, there also is a significant number of girls in the juvenile justice system. This rate of incarceration is endangering children at younger and younger ages.
This is America's pipeline to prison — a trajectory that leads to marginalized lives, imprisonment and often premature death. Although the majority of fourth graders cannot read at grade level, states spend about three times as much money per prisoner as per public school pupil.
CDF's vision with it's Cradle to Prison Pipeline campaign is to reduce detention and incarceration by increasing preventive supports and services children need, such as access to quality early childhood development and education services and accessible, comprehensive health and mental health coverage. Emphasis must be shifted for the sake of our children and our nation's future. Learn more-- http://www.childrensdefense.org/

During this political season of change, let's work to dismantle this pipeline.

The Main Line Education Monologues: Dreams Deferred or Realized documentary showing on PATV

The film documentary The Main Line Education Monologues: Dreams Deferred or Realized provides viewers a snapshot of the experience of twenty African American Lower Merion School District alumni who are graduates from the classes of 1952 through 1999. First viewed in 2006 at the Bryn Mawr Film Institute to a standing room only audience, viewers can catch the film on Lower Merion and Narberth's Public Access Television on April 4, 2009 at 10:00 pm on Comcast channel 99 and Verizon channel 34. View an introduction by the film's producer, Ellen Sall, and the president of Concerned Black Parents, Loraine Carter at 10:00 pm, the film follows at 10:24 pm. From the voices of those who lived it, learn more about redistricting, special education, parent engagement in academic success, and the affect of race in education in one of Pennsylvania's award winning school districts.

Government Mandated High School Proficiency "Exit" Exams Coming Soon to a School Near You

"We have allowed diplomas to be awarded to students who have not been able to demonstrate basic levels of preparedness for life beyond high school for too long by handing out ‘empty’ diplomas, we are cheating our children and our commonwealth." Dr. Gerald Zahorchak, Pennsylvania Secretary of Education

Pennsylvania state law passed last July established a one-year moratorium on any regulations regarding high school graduation requirements. The State Board of Education will continue its public hearing and input process over the next several months and will formally revisit the proposed regulations once the moratorium expires at the end of June 2009. Nevertheless plans are moving forward to establish high school graduation competency "exit" exam state laws.

What should students and parents know about high school graduation exit exams?

So what is the agreement on high school graduation regulations between the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE), the State Board of Education (SBE) and the Pennsylvania School Boards Association (PSBA). Well basically, by 2015 all of Pennsylvania's high school students will be required to pass competency exit exams in all core content subjects along with other criteria established by school districts (course completion, senior projects, grades, credits, etc.) in order to receive a certified high school diploma. Take precautionary note: exceptions will be made for special education students.

Those assessments can be chosen by your local school district, but they must have been independently validated to assure a high-quality level of academic rigor. Current validated exit exams include the 11-grade and 12th-grade retake Pennsylvania System of School Assessments (PSSAs), Advanced Placement (AP) or International Baccalaureate (IB) assessments. Under the new proposal the state tests, known now as the Keystone Exams but formerly called the Graduation Competency Assessment, would be an option for all school districts. However, students would continue to be mandated to take the PSSA's per the NCLB law.

Under the regulations advanced by the State Board, Pennsylvania would be required to offer school districts additional supports for struggling students, including: voluntary curriculum in English, math, science and social studies; strategies for identifying and helping students who need additional assistance; and improved teacher training. Students having an Individualized Education Plan (IEP), those in special education, may qualify for exemption from proving academic competency.

Will school districts really close the achievement gap by 2014?

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 (NCLB) exposed the nation to the education recession, if you will, experienced by millions of children all across one of the wealthiest and well educated nations around the globe. By 2014, one-hundred percent of the nation's students are expected to be proficient in mathematics, reading, writing, science and social studies, with the exception of those qualifying for specialized exams due to disabilities. It just so happens that the "achievement gap" NCLB intends to zap close is best recognized as being a fissure experienced mostly by blacks, Latinos, poor children, and "special needs" students. The data reveals that white students have benefited the most from America's education system. Whites are more likely than many of their non-white peers to be proficient in core content courses, and as such better prepared to pass high school competency graduation exams.

Case in point--Lower Merion.

Let us look at the Lower Merion School Districts' (LMSD) achievement gap to conjecture whether 100% of its black students will be proficient in core subjects and prepared for the high school graduation competency exams by the 2014-2015 school year.

LMSD is one of Pennsylvania's wealthiest school districts. Lower Merion is a suburb abutting Philadelphia along route 1. The 2010 school year budget is projected to be nearly 200 million dollars for a population of 6,800 students. It is a wager that there is no other school district in the state paying more per student in expenditures than LMSD. Technology abounds as do certified teachers who are among the highest paid in the state. LMSD is a blue-ribbon, award winning school district where more than 90% of its students are proficient or better in all PSSA scored areas Obviously, the vast majority of LMSDs' students will pass graduation exit exams and receive diplomas in preparation for success in college or the work-force.

On the other hand, LMSD educates about 550 black students; out of which about 160 students, 30 percent, have been identified as disabled and require special education services. The achievement gap between black students and their peers is significant for students approaching high school graduation. LMSD's 11th grade PSSA scores indicate that 36% of its black students were proficient in math in 2008 and 35% in 2002; illustrating virtually no growth in six years. During the same period black student reading proficiency levels have risen from 31% to 53%, yet remain below the 63% target. Finally, according to the PA Dept. of Education, http://www.paayp.com/, the total of all black student achievement as evidenced by the 2007-08 scores for grades 3-11 are reflected by a negative 5.3 point drop from 2007 levels in reading proficiency scores to 60.5%, and a slight decline by negative 1.3% to 61.8% in mathematics (black elementary students scored very well in math and reading thus raising the mean score).

According to 2006-07 program costs estimates, LMSD spent about 3.4 million dollars to close the achievement gap for all students. School board members and administrators, including Lower Merion's, have bemoaned that the federal government has not appropriated the NCLB funds needed to effectively close the achievement gap. Albeit true as the lack of federal funding may be, Lower Merion money abounds as does the achievement gap. One has to infer that closing the achievement gap takes more than money and certified teachers. Perhaps Marva Collins can enlarge our understanding about the sort of reform required to close the gap.

According to an American education icon, Mrs. Marva Collins, who mastered the ability to educate "unteachable," "learning disabled" and "problem children" to advanced levels, the mis-education of our nation's children is not a function of a child's race or neighborhood but of the teaching methods he or she is exposed to from kindergarten on. Our education system is more likely to label a child "learning disabled" than it is an educator "teaching disabled." Effective teaching requires making daily deposits so that every child can become a lifetime achiever and they will never have to go through life faced with "insufficient funds."

The Education Trust seems to agree with Mrs. Collins that teachers matter most to student achievement. If so, then what should parents know and understand about Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell's and Education Secretary Dr. Gerald Zahorchak's push to implement high school graduation--exit--exams, which will hold students more accountable to be able to apply, analyze, synthesize and evaluate information and communicate significant knowledge and understanding of mathematics, writing, reading, science, technology, and social studies starting with the graduation class of 2015.

The question begs asking: if a resource rich school district such as Lower Merion cannot close the achievement gap in nearly seven years what confidence can be placed in the state's ability to ensure that it does over the next five before exit exams become the law of the land and devastation to the black community? Please note that many schools across the nation have already closed the achievement gap and are now working to sustain their gains.

Dr. Gerald Zahorchak, Pennsylvania education secretary, said the standardized competency exams would hold school districts and students accountable.

According to the 11th-grade and 12th-grade retake reading and mathematics 2007 Pennsylvania System of State Assessment (PSSA) scores, more than 56,000 high school graduates received a diploma who graduated unprepared for college or the work force. Research presented to the State Board of Education found one in three Pennsylvania high school graduates who enrolls in a state-owned university or community college cannot pass a first-year college math or English course, and the failure of our high schools to prepare those students costs taxpayers more than $26 million annually. Pennsylvania is seeking to join the other 20+ states across the nation who implement exit exams.

How was the need for exit exams identified?
In December of 2006 Govenor Rendell's Commission on College and Career Success– a group of civic, education and business leaders– unanimously called for a statewide graduation requirement, including the use of Graduation Competency Assessments as a way for Pennsylvania to set high and uniform standards to ensure all graduating students are prepared for higher education or the knowledge-based workforce.

Since the Commission on College and Career Success report, the Department of Education enlisted the research team at Penn State’s College of Education following requests from state legislators, the Independent Regulatory Review Commission, and state-level education groups who completed a study and found that only 18 out of Pennsylvania's 500 school districts appropriately measure whether their students can read and do math at the 11th grade level in preparation for post-high school success.

As of March 2009 and in light of a moratorium on the issues, the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE), the State Board of Education (SBE) and the Pennsylvania School Boards Association (PSBA) have mutally agreed on several key policy issues and are preparing to move forward after the June 2009 session.

Opposition to Competency Assessments Include...

Opponents of exit exams like the teacher's union, Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) argue that mandated exit exams are a policy change having wide ranging social, economic and educational impacts along with negative consequences including increased dropout rates, narrowed curriculum, diversion of resources away from education of students and toward more standardized testing of students, and disproportionate harm to impoverished, minority, English language learners and special education students. The argument continues that the cost for remediation would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to tax payers.

Recommendations by the oppostion includes...

The PSEA recommends that the resolution to mandated exit exams and the achievement gap is revealed through increased parental involvement programs, especially those who themselves grew up in homes where education was not valued; transition programs from elementary to middle, and from middle to high school; smaller class sizes in the early grades; early childhood education, particularly for children who start school behind their peers and those coping with poverty; the state should fund schools at their adequacy targets to help improve student achievement. Apparently the teacher's union is not in agreement with Marva Collins that the teachers make education meaningful for students, parents are supplemental not causal.

THERE IS STILL TIME FOR PARENTS TO BECOME ENGAGED ACTIVISTS!

Add your thoughts to the following short list of considerations on competency assessments action items.

• The achievement gap must be closed by all means necessary if exit exams are to become state law.
• Students need to be educated by proficient, knowledgeable teachers who thoroughly understand PDE's academic standards and its relevancy to the curriculum and their lesson plans.
• Students need teachers who have the capacity to decipher the standardized data results in real-time in order to identify achievement--standard--gaps and provide informed pedagogy to fill them in a timely fashion.
• Students need school board members, administrators and teachers who understand the need for measurable goals and effective methods to address the impact of low expectations, academic tracking of students into below standard level courses, and sustained enrollment of students in special education whose primary "learning disability" is underachievement in reading and mathematics.
• Students need school districts to do more than talk about parent engagement and community collaboration. Parents do not know the academic standards, the curriculum or a teacher's lessons plans, yet they are often blamed for student failure. Parent and community engagement programs such as Dr. Joyce Epstein's can be employed to assist school administrators in engaging parents beyond the school's open house, parent conferences, PTA/HSA sessions, special events, and disciplinary hearings. Details on the Center for School, Family, and School Partnership at John Hopkins University can be read on the website http://www.csos.jhu.edu/P2000/center.htm
• Students need curriculum that is relevant, rigorous and relational to their lives.
• Students need to understand what is expected of them and what they should know and be able to do at each grade level, and so should their parents.
• Students need to understand the Zero Disciplinary Tolerance policy and how infractions lead to underachievement due to suspensions and loss of direct instruction, alternative school placements, or even time in detention centers and criminal records.
• How is it that a "master" educator like Marva Collins is well-able to circumvent student behavior problems in the classroom. What does she know that other teachers need to know in order to reduce the incidents of disciplinary actions that lead students down the road to prison from the school building. What do PDE and districts need to grasp about the relationship of a students' ability to read by the fourth grade and higher probability they will be ordered to a county detention center when they cannot read; disproportionately if the student is black or Latino.
• All school board members, administrators, and teachers should receive professional development and training on the Cradle to Prison Pipeline as presented by the Children's Defense Fund (CDF), headed by Marian Wright Edelman. CDF has made understanding these matters easier with "America's Cradle to Prison Pipeline Report," which can be downloaded here http://www.childrensdefense.org/child-research-data-publications/data/cradle-prison-pipeline-report-2007-full-highres.html Further the CDF researched the status of Pennsylvania's students and provides a fact sheet that can be viewed online here: http://www.childrensdefense.org/child-research-data-publications/data/state-data-repository/cradle-to-prison-pipeline/cradle-prison-pipeline-pennsylvania-2009-fact-sheet.pdf.

A final word on exit exams by Education Secretary Gerald L. Zahorchak,

“In the end, all of us will achieve our common goal of ensuring Pennsylvania produces high school graduates who can compete with students from across the country and around the world”