Parent Voices on the High School Exit Exam
New America Media, Posted: Jul 06, 2009
Editor’s Note: The Legislature proposes to suspend the California High School Exit Exam for four years, an idea prompted by the state’s budget crisis and deep cuts to school funding. Parents with children in public schools give their views on the idea. Interviews were conducted by phone and email by NAM contributor Justine Drennan.
Pam Brady, president of California’s Parent Teacher Association. She lives in Malibu and has three children.
“The state legislature has spent years and years worrying about accountability, and now they’re making decisions based on minimum standards, not based on high standards. That’s not the way you make good education decisions. They should not be based on the economy. It’s really not okay to say we’re in a low economy - therefore let’s lower our standards. It’s shortchanging the kids and it’s shortchanging the state. Who is going to be the workforce? That is going to be the children.”
Carl Barnes, a firefighter and father of four in San Francisco, where he was raised and attended public schools. His two youngest children currently attend public schools in San Francisco.
“There needs to be some type of indicator of what has been done for children throughout their junior high and high school years. I know it’s an issue around money, but my wife works for City College, and I know that [students] have to take a placement test for junior college. There’s a Muslim school that has an arrangement with City College that allows [students] to take the placement test while in high school as practice, and a lot of them are doing very well. It’s almost like if you take away the exit exam, how do you replace it? It leaves the door open for teachers to feel like there’s no accountability.”
Dan Dykwel, president of the Palo Alto Council of PTAs, who has a son in college.
“The exit exam isn’t really an issue in Palo Alto. I’m pretty sure everyone here passes.”
Angelina Rojas, a mother of four, a social worker at Manzanita Elementary School in Oakland, and a member of the Parent Leadership Action Network in Oakland. Her youngest child will enter Skyline High School in Oakland in the fall.
“I think it’s a good idea that there’s going to be an exit exam suspension because the students that don’t know the language…have less knowledge about the exam than the rest of the students. I’m thinking if they have the exit exam, maybe for immigrants they should do a different one.”
Loretta Seva'aetasi, an administrative analyst specialist at San Francisco State University and mother of four children who have all attended public school in San Francisco. Three of them passed the exit exam on the first try and graduated high school. Her youngest daughter is still in school.
“My feelings on [the exit exam] were strong in the beginning because I feel that the powers that be think that testing is what it is all about. We need to address issues in classrooms and the varying levels of understanding that exist in every classroom. I think [suspending the exam] is a good idea because tests are not the do- all, die-all, and it doesn't take into consideration that some kids are just not good at taking tests. Also, this exam is at an eighth grade level, and if many students are not passing, what measures is the state going to take to remedy that? More tests? “
Kido, an individual child advocate who deals with equity and diversity issues and a member of the Parent Leadership Action Network in Oakland. She is a single parent of two special needs children who attended public schools in Oakland and Berkeley.
“It’s a good idea to get rid of it. My 17 year-old graduated last year, and both my kids passed the first time around, but the whole school system has been centered around passing this test. It’s made a huge change in how people are trained in school, so I don’t believe that those who are actually ready to go on to higher levels of education are prepared. CAHSEE doesn’t support students being ready for college. They’re just prepared for the test. Classrooms are run specifically to make sure people can pass the test. After they have the information, they’re ready to add new information, but there isn’t any progression.”
Read NAM's complete coverage of the California High School Exit Exam here.
Page
1 of 1
|
User Comments
Iftikhar Ahmad on Jul 06, 2009 at 12:26:43 said:
Muslim parents teach their children to respect their teachers. From a very young age, we are taught that Islam teaches us that after our parents, our teachers are most deserving of respect.
-->It must be an extremely confusing time for the Muslim parent in Leytonstone, London. For up to 30 parents may face prosecution for withdrawing their children from school, disobeying the teachers in the school, simply to secure a decent moral upbringing for their children. The school had decided to have a week of lessons about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender history. Part of this was a special adaptation of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet retitled Romeo and Julian as well as fairytales and stories changed to show men falling in love with men. Rather than filling the heads of impressionable boys and girls with fatuous drivel about gay penguins, schools should be ashamed of the fact that they are sending children out into the world barely able to read, write and add up properly. Muslim children are leaving schools without learning their cultural roots and linguistic skills.
The action was being taken against the parents as part of a policy of ' promoting tolerance'. So why not tolerate parents, who, for sincerely-held reasons, consider their children too young to be taught about gay relationships? This isn't education, its cultural fascism. A record numbers of pupils persistently played truant in 2006-07, with around 272,950 pupils persistently absent in 2007, missing more than 20% of school. We rarely see councils prosecute the parents of these persistent truants. Yet, the parents who removed their children as a one-off to protect their morality may be prosecuted!
If the local council does decide to go through with a prosecution, it would be in line with the government's approach to the Muslim community. Muslims who believe homosexuality is a sin would be labelled as extremists. Liberal totalitarianism is a growing phenomenon in Britain and the west in general but many people will be shocked that the school can override a parent's view of what's appropriate or inappropriate to teach their children.
This latest episode should be a wakeup call for Muslim parents. Muslim parents MUST explain our moral standards to schools and be prepared to take steps to protect our children’s morals and values from a growing agenda to impose liberal values upon them. This is an eye opening for those Muslim parents who keep on sending their children to state schools to be mis-educated and de-educated by non-Muslim monolingual teachers.
The solution of all the problems facing Muslim children is state funded Muslim schools with bilingual Muslim teachers. Those state schools where Muslim children are in majority may be designated as Muslim community schools. Bilingual Muslim children need state funded Muslim schools with bilingual Muslim teachers as role models during their developmental periods.
Iftikhar Ahmad
www.londonschoolofislamics.org.uk