http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/4349498.html
The school system serves the needs of some students very well, but is failing the large majority. I agree with Jennings on that point. I also agree that the problem is systemic. However, in my view, Jennings is blind to the mistakes that have been made, and could be corrected by the board and school administration. For example, a lot of money has been spent on an attendance policy which reportedly boosted average test scores, but the boost in test scores appears to be more an effect of pushing out the poor performing students than improving the performance of poor performing students, which in turn contributed to a decline in enrollment and revenues. On the other hand, funding was cut, not increased for the Arts for Academic Achievement program, which helped to close the learning gap to a significant degree without doing harm to the high performing students, and certainly without contributing to a decline in enrollment and loss of revenue. The board went forward with a class size reduction program in the early 1990s, and ignored concerns raised by the NAACP that inexperienced teachers would be concentrated in some schools unless the board worked out an agreement with the teachers union to fill the new positions with new teachers instead of simply creating a huge number of opportunities for teachers to bid into and out of schools. In my opinion, the widening of the academic achievement gap in the Minneapolis Public Schools during the early 1990s was due in large part to the segregation of new teachers in schools serving poor neighborhoods (and the restructuring of the curriculum for the children in those schools). When school reform after school reform makes a quality education less and less accessible to a majority of students, you have to consider the possibility that the education reformers and their principle financial backers are actually trying to widen, and not close the academic achievement gap. Jennings represents a constituency (employers / chamber of commerce) that benefits from the kind of stratified educational system that we now have in Minneapolis: An educational system that mirrors and reinforces a class and color-based caste system which benefits that filthy rich most of all. -Doug Mann, King Field http://educationright.tripod.com REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
