Most Monroe city schools have low-performance grades, but alumni groups and education leaders are mostly silent. Where is the outrage?
A few weeks ago, the alumni of Carroll High School were tremendously upset that several of its football coaches were suspended for reportedly violating rules, endangering the school’s chances at winning a state football championship.
That same month, the state released scores showing that 93 percent of the School’s students scored below basic in geometry, 89 percent of its students were below basic in history, 82 percent of the students were below basic in Algebra, 78 percent were below basic in biology, 70 percent were below basic in English 1, and 63 percent were below basic in English 1.
There was hardly a yawn from most alumni, who seem to accept academic underachievement as OK. However, if the football team has a losing season, it’s considered a tragedy.
The letter grades released by the state give a confusing picture for high schools and often hide the fact that behind the padded high school letter grade is an even worse student performance record.
While most students at Carroll are failing in every core subject, and the average ACT score is 15.1, the school still received a “C” grade this week.
Wossman high is no better. This week the school was assigned a letter Grade of B. The letter grade gives the impression that the school has something to brag about. However, the supporting documentation beneath the letter grade shows that with the exception of English 2 students, the majority of the students at Wossman are performing below basic in core subjects: History, 84 percent below basic, Algebra, 80 percent below basic, geometry, 65 percent below basic, biology, 60 percent below basic, and English 1, 54 percent below basic.
Neville has an “A” grade, and the majority of its students are above basic in all core subjects.
Why aren’t the alumni of Carroll and Wossman upset about the poor classroom performance of its students?
Why aren’t social media posts flooded with outrage demanding that those responsible do something?
Where is the outrage?
The high school letter grades often disguise school performance because high schools can hide their academic failures by getting high points for attendance and graduation rates and other ways to get bonus points to make up for classroom inefficiencies.
Elementary schools have no way to fake their grades. The scores tell the story.
No one seems to be upset that Madison Foster Elementary, Minnie Ruffin Elementary, Roy Shelling Elementary, Baukdull Falk, and Carroll Jr. High all have letter grades of “F.”
No one seems to be upset that Jefferson Elementary, Berg Jones Lane, Martin Luther King Jr. High, Clara Hall, and Carver Elementary all have letter grades of “D.”
Why is there no outrage?
It’s probably because a large part of the problem is not in the school system itself but in the family culture that’s sending students into the school arena not motivated to achieve.
Have we reached a point where a football championship is more important than academics?
There is something wrong when parents go all out to dress up kids for an elementary school prom or homecoming while the school is underperforming academically
A large part of the problem is “us.”
It may be the reason we don’t show any rage over low scores because we are a large part of the problem, and we don’t want to accept that responsibility.
In Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar,” Cassius says, “The fault lies not in our stars, but in ourselves.”
Maybe that explains our lack of outrage.
Perhaps most of the fault is in ourselves as parents; there is no one else we can blame, so there is no outrage.
