Editorial

U-turn

Forward to the past

Another year, another new approach to the mis-education of America's children. Only this approach isn't new at all but an old, tried and failed one: Let each state have its own educational standards or lack thereof. Eliminate those bothersome national ratings. So it will no longer be possible to see at how students in Arkansas rank compared to those in, say, Iowa or New York. Which could be embarrassing.

Back in the past, which is fast returning, the quality of a student's education depended on where he lived. If in New York, he had to pass that state's demanding Regents exam in order to graduate. In states like Arkansas, just a report card with passing marks would do. There was no national standard, no way to compare how a student in Fort Smith might be doing compared to one in Des Moines or Schenectady--just as there wouldn't be under this "new" approach to national educational standards. By abolishing them. Call it the Leave Every Kid Behind law.

The country is coming full circle. What was is to be again, only maybe bigger and worse. Each state is now to set its own standards, high or low or non-existent. And with its own standards, its own tests. Which is great for the testing business. And with each state defining what is proficient and what isn't, the test results can be made to look better each year, even if the students aren't learning more. States can now set their own standards in the basics like reading, math and science but can add new subjects. Arkansas has already added one: computer science. That way, says the state's still new commissioner of education, Johnny Key, our kids can compete in the job market.

The old goal of a well-educated citizenry governing itself, each having received a good education in the arts and sciences, has given way to equipping them for the job market. For what's the use of studying Socrates or Plato or learning Newton's laws of motion if none of that gets you a job? Is education now to become a sub-species of vocational education?

"Our goal forward is," says Commissioner Key, "for each student in Arkansas, we want them to be actively engaged a year out from graduation in a career field, college or the military." Just pigeonhole 'em early, assign 'em a track, and make sure they stick to it. In another century, Jose Ortega y Gasset diagnosed this syndrome. He called it the barbarism of specialization.

Not that this old New Approach to education is all bad. For example, it does away with the old requirement that teachers be paper-certified, a favorite of teachers' unions that have long sought to monopolize their own job market. So that now a businessman or artist or plumber who's already had one successful career can step into the classroom and share his well-earned knowledge, maybe even wisdom, with another generation. Welcome!

But in other ways, this not so new arrangement is worse than the old. For instance, student test scores would no longer figure in evaluating how good a job the teacher was doing. Those teachers who are just marking time, dozing their way to retirement, can keep nodding off at their desks till the bell rings at the end of another wasted day. Leaving every child behind represents a victory for all the deadwood in the system, and discourages new growth. It's bad for good teachers.

"The key here," proclaims Commissioner Key, "is that we're transforming Arkansas. It's not transforming Arkansas schools. It's not transforming Arkansas teachers. It's the state. It's the community of the state. It has to change." If we really want to change Arkansas, we will need standards that are specific, not vague, and tests that are as rigorous as those in the Nation's Report Card, the National Assessment of Educational Progress. And then compare our students' performances, and improvement, to all the other states.

Only with that type of transparency, accountability, and ultimately giving the parents the choice to attend better public schools can Arkansas reach its potential in the classroom.

Editorial on 07/01/2016

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