the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, the 2017 National Assessment of Educational Progress, aka the nation’s “report card,” was released last April and its was filled with some very sobering facts on public education. As we head into 2019 the Ridgewood thought it was time to restate some of the findings.
According to the report only 37 percent of 12th-graders tested proficient or better in reading, and only 25 percent did so in math. Among black students, only 17 percent tested proficient or better in reading, and just 7 percent reached at least a proficient level in math.
The atrocious National Assessment of Educational Progress performance is only a fraction of the bad news. Nationally, our high school graduation rate is over 80 percent. That means high school diplomas, which attest that these students can read and compute at a 12th-grade level, are conferred when 63 percent are not proficient in reading and 75 percent are not proficient in math.
For black students, the news is even worse. Roughly 75 percent of black students received high school diplomas attesting that they could read and compute at the 12th-grade level. However, 83 percent could not read at that level, and 93 percent could not do math at that level.
I don’t understand how this can be?
.
How can a system that teaches, celebrates and prioritizes gender politics, social justice, racial and cultural balkinization and socialism over educational fundamentals (aka “the 3 Rs”) and objective fact based learning (aka “drill and kill”) fail?
.
Let’s talk about the “abbot districts” as established by NJ Supreme Court.
The state mandate the same $$$ is spent per student in every district.
Nice thought, but it won’t work. Why?
The teachers union objects to school choice so underperforming lazy tenured teachers can slide while the students do not learn.
More important is that in Paterson , an abbot district, students only need to attend in order to progress from one grade to another, and get a diploma.
So let’s get the secret out… A diploma from one of these districts is as worthless as a piece of toilet paper.
If the motivate students could choose a school to attend, with a voucher, they would excell.
But thanks to the NJ teachers unions it will never happen. They own Gov Murphy