<p>^For the record, I agree with the school policies cited by SlitheyTove, particularly “making acceleration contingent on an algebra-readiness assessment and teacher approval.” The issue with large class size is of course non-ideal, but that burden is spread equally across all students, and could not be alleviated without extra funding.</p>
<p>Like any other policy, random selection can be implemented well or poorly. However, in an objective sense it is always “fair”–just, in the above case, the implementation was unreasonable.</p>
Did you miss my post where I explained that the high schools my kids attended did not OFFER AP Calculus? Neither of their high schools offered a single AP class in math or sciences. You can’t just “open up” a class that that doesn’t exist. You have to have teachers qualified to teach the advanced courses; you need to have a critical mass of students to fill a class; a curriculum needs to be developed and submitted to the powers that be for approval to qualify as “AP”.</p>
<p>There is wiggle room in the “most rigorous” catagory. Your GC should look at the big picture and determine if your child has challenged her/himself. If you have questions as far as scheduling the GC should be able to ease your mind. D had to drop her third year of Spanish because it conflicted with another program and our school is so small Span 3 was only offered 1 period. He still checked the most rigorous box and D was also accepted to her first choice school as well as other reachier campuses.</p>
<p>No. We created an “individualized” education. </p>
<p>Some parents are wealthy and they can create an individualized program for their kids by selecting among an array of excellent private schools, or moving to live in a district with a preferred school, or hiring private tutors for their kids. We didn’t have that option (and if we did, I’m not sure we would have gone with it).</p>
<p>Some parents don’t like what the school offers, and create their own individualized programs by homeschooling. I didn’t consider that to be a viable option either. </p>
<p>There’s an old adage: “Give a man a fish, and he will have food for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he will have food for a lifetime.” I taught my kids to fish. (metaphorically, of course)</p>
<p>I’m amazed at how quickly this thread took off in a different direction regarding accelerated education, accomodations, resource allocations … I have a friend who was just elected to school board here and I think I’ll advise her to read this thread.</p>
<p>^^ Public schools exist to attempt to provide equal education for all children enrolled. Hence why parents who seek individualized education for their children choose private or homeschooling. What right have you to push a public school to grant your child, and not other children of similar ability, an individualized education?</p>
<p>You also still have not addressed the issue that not all parents teach their children how to fish, for better or for worse. You and your children are in a highly privileged position, and you exercise that privilege with complete disregard for its consequences on the less privileged. Interesting parallel to race theory.</p>
<p>Somewhere, several pages back, someone asked if it was possible to Be Yourself (pursue your personal passions) and still get into an Elite, despite not always taking the ultimate “hardest curriculum available.” </p>
<p>The answer is yes, but be warned you may find yourself in a dogfight if your student is an apparent academic achiever (early on) & if administration has their eyes on him or her as a “star”, Val, whatever. Happened to us. D had already taken 9 AP’s and 10 Honors prior to senior yr. Administration wanted her to take add’l advanced science/math, when those were not her passions, despite excelling in them. D wanted to stand her ground but felt self-conscious about resisting the Powers That Be – nonconfrontational as she is.</p>
<p>A la calmom, I instructed her to fight the battle on her own. She said the pressure was pretty intense. Part of me wanted to be the rescuer, as well as the defender, as I knew quite well that in fact she would have better results if she followed her passions senior year, instead of caving in to “appearances.” (Which was the way Admin also described the situation.) But I also felt that she would feel more validated & have more credibility if I did not get involved. I merely pumped up her confidence, and she won the battle. </p>
<p>I’m also convinced that her several Ivy offers were partly a reflection of her sticking to her passions (vs. “appearances.”). In the end it only came down to the difference of one AP (10 rather than 11), but it also conformed more to the person she presented herself to be in the college apps. (She chose the one AP and one seminar she wanted in sr. yr., vs. the two science/math AP courses they wanted her to take.)</p>
<p>In some ways this is O/T, I know – perhaps not relative to the thread title, but where the discussion has meandered. </p>
<p>As to the meandering, I’m divided: It is difficult to assume that every parent (let alone every student) has the knowledge & courage to navigate the frequent resistance to various opportunities & even legal accommodations, without a little help from the schools themselves. Ethically speaking, I think the schools have an obligation to disclose opportunities on both ends of the spectrum, and to provide those if at all possible, to all who qualify – whether or not those students & families know they qualify. I will tell you that my colleagues in education – at least the ones I respect as having integrity – consider this their duty as well: to initiate the communication about that. It works even better if all parties are unanimously advocating for the child, but about half the time, it doesn’t work that way. Maybe because there are so many different (foreign) cultures with which I work in the schools: many of them don’t even know the lingo, let alone the pathways. I would consider it unethical for a school to wait to be tapped on the shoulder (if they knew legitimate opportunities were available) – although realistically, with class sizes & all other demands, that often is what “has” to happen, and the way it does happen. But there are often several needlessly lost years with this approach.</p>
There was no “schedule”. My son was in a contained classroom, the kids arrived at 8:30 am and went home at 3 pm, or thereabouts. The high school was a 5-10 minute walk away, started at 8:00 am, and was on block scheduling. There was an algebra class there first period, given on alternate days, and was usually about 80 minutes long. So on the days that my son had algebra at the high school, he would arrive at the school where his 8th grade class was about an hour late. The 8th grade teacher wasn’t happy about the plan, so she marked my son absent on the days when he was late. My son didn’t bother arguing with the teacher – he personally made arrangements with the lady in the office of his school who managed attendance records to check in with her on the days that he arrived late, and she would correct the records. </p>
<p>I am telling you this so that you can understand that my son had to overcome some specific barriers that were thrust in his way – and he took it upon himself to work out a solution. They were relatively minor barriers, but one concern that could have been raised at the time was whether my son had the maturity to handle the arrangement. </p>
<p>Everything you have posted reflects an attitude of wanting the school to do things for you – nothing about what you can do for yourself. If my kids had that attitude, I honestly would not have lifted a finger to make special arrangements for them. </p>
<p>I don’t think that my kids deserve or are entitled to anything more than the public schools offer to everyone else. But we could always ask – and that is what we did when appropriate. Sometimes we got what we asked for, sometimes not. But it was never the school’s job to anticipate our needs – the responsibility was ours. </p>
<p>You also seem to think that self-advocacy skills are something that must be instilled by the parent. I disagree – often the case is that kids develop these skills precisely because their parents can’t or won’t help them. Certainly it will help if a parent guides the child toward developing those skills and provides support – but the first and most important part of self-advocacy is self-responsibility. </p>
<p>
What do you mean by “curricular advantage”? I never pursued “exceptional acceleration” for my kids-- I only was interested in tweaking things along the way as needed. Part of that tweaking was understanding that there is a lot more than academics involved.</p>
<p>When the overriding premise is to make everything equal it typically leads to what the communists had in the old Soviet Union - an equal and low standard. The one thing the US has had going for it is to let people find opportunities, and not suppress them in the interest of being equal. </p>
<p>The easiest way to equalize the handicap that children whose parents can’t or wont speak for them is to deny opportunities to those whose parents do. We can continue to say that to make the school experience equal, because there are some parents who cannot help their kids at home, all parents should be prevented from doing so, just so that the latter group doesn’t gain an unfair advantage.</p>
<p>So rather than look at ideal situations, it’s better to focus on practical ones - in life, we are more likely to get what we want by asking for it rather than waiting for it to be given, and if this skill is learned at the expense of not getting into the so-called “secret” track, a better lesson has been learned.</p>
<p>^ I’m not in favor of that kind of “equality” either, dad; nor am I suggesting that passivity is a good strategy. I’m trying to be realistic with the situation in public schools with diverse populations, not all of whom possess sophistication about possibilities (and limits!) at those schools. I know you’re speaking to everyone, but I want to chime in, since I just “spoke.” Interestingly, mostly in my situation I spend more time explaining to parents the limits at those schools rather than the options – with the added advice that those parents more often must provide those opportunities that the schools are too burdened (with educational triage) to provide.</p>
<p>Sometimes what appears to be a ‘secret’ track really isn’t. </p>
<p>In our district, if a 5th grader scores above 99%ile on math standardized tests (too high a bar in my opinion), then the parent is contacted about skipping 6th and accelerating to 7th grade math. For those who pass the bar, its an automatic if the parent agrees. For those who are below the bar, no information is given (“Mrs so and so, your child just didn’t meet the grade for the acceleration program”). Several parents who then hear of other kids being accelerated feel like there is a secret track that they did not know about when that is not really the case. </p>
<p>Same with 7th grade Honors. If the kids meet threshold, their parents get a letter inviting them, leading to “Why did so and so get to be in Honors and you don’t” among those not invited.</p>
Kudos for your son. However, in your extended explanation I don’t see any reason why the opportunity could not have been offered to other students, perhaps those who also showed signs (through high test grades or consistently finishing work early, or any other reasonable indicator) of readiness. Maturity is something that should be judged by parent, school, and student; but what if parent and student have no idea that the option exists, or that it’s “right” to ask (by “right,” I mean in the same sense that it is “wrong” to break school rules)?</p>
<p>
False. I understand perfectly the consequences of not knowing or learning the proper ways to defy authority in my youth, and I gladly accept the outcome. In high school, I have indeed learned to self-advocate, primarily from observing the outcome and methods of other parents who did so for their children. However, from a philosophical standpoint, I believe that a public school has an ethical duty to give all its students access to equal opportunity.</p>
<p>You expect self-advocacy from children as young as 6, citing your own children as models; however, your children have clearly been taught from birth that rules can be bent. This is a different issue altogether than self-responsibility. I can easily be a self-responsible person but under the impression that administrative rules are set in stone, because my parents told me so–assuming that I believe my parents and follow their loving guidance, why would I reasonably think the opposite of their wisdom?</p>
<p>You can, of course, ask for a special exception, and it’s up to the school to grant or reject it. However, you seem to believe that being granted this special exception, without offering a similar opportunity to other students, is ethical–and with this I deeply disagree.</p>
<p>Definitions requested:
curricular advantage - Being able to pursue the hardest available curriculum suited to a given student’s abilities.
exceptional acceleration - Acceleration (of one’s curriculum, obviously) based on an exception to a rule.</p>
<p>Dad<em>of</em>3 - Though I would favor option C over option A, I still believe that option A is more fair than option B (though both are suboptimal). Helping kids at home is not a factor directly controlled by the school administration; allowing one student but not another to skip ahead in courses, solely because one student had more vocal/persistent parents (in my anecdotal experience, the parents were the driving force when an initial request is denied), is tantamount to allowing the wealthy student but not the poor student to skip ahead because the wealthy parent can donate more money to the school. If the school grants an exception to the persistent parent, it will get that parent off its back; thus, the admin. derives a benefit (time and stress saved) substantively similar to that of a larger donation to the Annual Fund. (And yes, some public schools run Annual Fund campaigns.)</p>
<p>
Quite the capitalistic POV. I, alas, am an out Canadian-style (and Canadian) socialist. Since I speak to a US audience, I will make special note of the difference between socialism and communism.</p>
<p>
This would be an example of a reasonable implementation of egalitarian acceleration policies. I would not consider it or its ilk a “secret math track.” But calmom’s example is a different matter.</p>
<p>Keil, this is not a zero sum game where Calmom’s son’s voracious appetite for math somehow snatched some math out of the hand of a less aggressive kid. There is plenty of math in the world.</p>
<p>I’m not sure your logic works although I think it’s great that you care.</p>
<p>The reality in most public school systems is that the administration cares very much about things like class size, standardized test scores, and not getting sued by parents seeking the accomodations for their special needs kids to which they are legally entitled. They care very little about whether some kid at the tail end of the distribution of ability in some subject is having his or her needs addressed. They also care very little about providing customized instruction unless it is legally mandated (i.e. paying for a shadow, providing appropriate instruction for a kid with autism or LD’s.)</p>
<p>So until we get to a point where educating kids who are learning above grade level becomes a mandate, parents have the choice to either accept the school districts policies on beyond grade level instruction, or to advocate for their kid.</p>
<p>The fact that there are, unfortunately, parents who don’t speak English, can’t take half a day off of work to meet with the principal, don’t know how the system works, etc. is really a poor rationale for the CalMom’s of the world to sit back and accept the abysmal status quo. It’s not like her kid stole all the smarts from the oxygen leaving the kids without an advocate with no smarts.</p>
<p>And if you’re really curious- there was a wonderful OP Ed in the WSJ which I can’t now locate a couple of years ago which laid out a very chilling analysis as to why teacher’s unions got on the bandwagon for limiting class size, despite the evidence that marginal differences (i.e. 20 kids in a class vs. 22) had absolutely no impact on learning (we’re not talking about a class with 46 kids vs. 9).</p>
<p>Why? Well, do the math. Smaller classes equals teacher shortages equals more people rushing into teaching equals more teachers equals more union dues. The unions could hardly back the research which showed that the factors which would lead to FEWER teachers but better teachers might actually improve education in this country. Fewer teachers means less union dollars.</p>
<p>blossom, I would agree with you except that in many cases, including calmom’s, it IS a zero-sum game. She argues that oftentimes there is limited space in the higher math class, and for various reasons (equally applicable to many, many families) outside learning options were not possible.</p>
<p>So, why should calmom’s S have received that limited space? He DID receive the space because he asked–or rather, because he and his parents asked persistently until the request was granted. I doubt that “Can I take this higher-level math class at a different school nearby?” was responded to with “Yes!” right from the beginning. </p>
<p>I assure you that I’m not lacking in cynicism regarding the reality of public school systems, although I will admit to an overdose of idealism regarding ethical standards.</p>
<p>Columbia_Student - My father’s Ph.D. was in organic chemistry, written in English. As a third-grader, I was one of his proof-readers (not of the entire dissertation, obviously), and IIRC I spotted 5 grammar errors in the one-page acknowledgement alone. I’ve never said that my parents don’t speak English–they know the language well enough to get by in most any American situation. But knowing a language and being fluent in a language are two different cases entirely. E.g. If you were living in China with a reasonable grasp of the spoken language but difficulty with advanced vocabulary (I’m pretty sure my parents don’t know the word “administration,” though they do know “teacher” and “principal”) and grammar, and with a heavy spoken accent, would you be comfortable engaging in polite confrontation/conflict with a native-born fluent speaker of that language? --Even if YOU would be, can you understand why many others in such a situation would not be? And this is disregarding cultural differences in what constitutes respect for authority.</p>
<p>Completely OT and not related at all to this thread…</p>
<p>Keil, I’ll write you a letter of rec for UG if you need it. You are as “well-spoken” as any kid I’ve seen on this site. And I’ve been here since dirt. You’ve got the guts and the “groceries” to make it anywhere. More than that , IMO you have “spark”. Any college should be proud to get you. </p>
<p>Back to …uhhh…whatever it was y’all were doing.</p>
<p>Calmom, I was talking about middle school. My son (unlike Marite’s) wasn’t so radically advanced that he was taking Calculus then. OTOH accelerating meant that it looked like he would run out of math classes before high school was over. We figured we’d cross that bridge when we came to it. We thought he might have to do AP Statistics or look outside the high school. As it happened a bunch of kids his year got ahead and they decided to create a new post Calc BC class. It was still a pretty small class, so I suppose that year they cost the school a bit of a teachers’ salary or at least made some other classes a bit larger. Ironically it met the same period as AP Latin, so my son did the work and took exams in a free period and taught himself the material. In previous year’s the accelerated students found local colleges to do advanced math. </p>
<p>We are lucky - our school is considered pretty average, but because it is very large, they are usually able to do something to meet the needs of the advanced students without spending a lot of extra money. I know one doesn’t always have a choice about where to live, but I don’t think I would have stayed in a town that didn’t at least have a calculus class.</p>
<p>I always hoped that the exceptions made for my son would lead to the schools being willing to make more exceptions and perhaps to create more organized systems to identify the students in need of more acceleration. I certainly did my best to let other parents know what we were up to.</p>
You are as “well-spoken” as any kid I’ve seen on this site. And I’ve been here since dirt. You’ve got the guts and the “groceries” to make it anywhere. More than that , IMO you have “spark”. Any college should be proud to get you. </p>