Some schools in the United States have stopped handing out failing grades, or at least are delaying them while students get a chance to improve.
In Grand Rapids, Mich., work that would justify an “F” will get an “H” for “held,” ABC News reported. The school superintendent, Bernard Taylor, said students will have several choices — including retaking a course, doing additional work or agreeing on another plan with teachers — but the grade will become a failing one if nothing is done within 12 weeks.
“I never see anyone doing anything but punishing kids,” Taylor said. “If the choice is between letting kids fail and giving them another opportunity to succeed, I’m going to err on the side of opportunity.”
Taylor and many other teachers and administrators say they believe many children quickly become discouraged and failing them contributes to the country’s high dropout rate. He argues that children need to see a way forward.
Critics say the practice is amounts to coddling children.
“The task is to change the reality, not the labeling of it,” said Alan Kazdin, a child psychiatrist at Yale.
“I never see anyone doing anything but punishing kids,” Taylor said. “If the choice is between letting kids fail and giving them another opportunity to succeed, I’m going to err on the side of opportunity.”
It used to be called Summer school.
the problem is everyone is expected to go to college where they are college material or not.
that concept is just plain wrong.
As Dean Vernon Wormer said: “Fat lazy and stupid is no way to go through life” (The fat is an assumption back by numerous other articles)
or
Yes I know we lost 10 billion last month, give me another chance and 20 billion and I promise we’ll do better. Hummm maybe the kids are alright, long as they ascend to CEO positions on graduation.
I guess bailouts are happening all over Michigan, not just Detroit.
#2, what are you talking about? Every American goes to college and we have migrants or illegal aliens pick up the trash, cut our hair, drive the EMTs, build the houses, buildings, and highways, and cook in all the restaurants, etc.
Don’t you read Dilbert? The smartest guy in the place is the janitor.
This is all about babying kids. People no a days can`t tell their children, no. God forbid that they realize their kids aren`t perfect. Guess what allowing kids to think that they should`t be allow to fail will ultamately bring this country down. Kids will never learn to take responsibilty for their actions. They think life is a video game, and they get unlimited lives\resets. If this keeps up the world will truely be laughing at what babies we have grown up into.
Another point if you don`t believe in war and violence don`t join the armed forces, it is no longer a free check for education. Moms against war can piss off. NO MORE FREE RIDES.
This article fails to point out that most kids who fail in school do it because they are bored or realize that the majority of the trash they throw at you is useless in the real world. It very rarely has something to do with the kid being slow/stupid.
*sigh*
The US education system needs a total rebuild, by this point. Well, the public education system anyway, I hear the universities are quite good.
Anyway, this is another attack on freedom, and since I know someone is going to ask what I’m talking about:
“No practical freedom is complete without the freedom to [fail and] take the consequences.”
It’s good. My kids will have less competition on the job market when they grew up.
As little as I like it, at least it forces the kids to do something to improve their grade. And that’s a hell of a lot better than just passing them on through.
In the end, the child’s parents are about 60% factor of the end result of a child’s education level.
The school is probably 40%.
Therefore, most parents that really care about their children and that have the means to do, move to an area to get the best public system possible.
This increases the parent’s share to near 100%.
The problem with this, the kids that get the hurt most are minority children because usually all urban area schools suck and they haven’t been taught the “white culture” trick of moving to where the schools don’t suck.
Black people will have as promising a future as white people once they learn the method whiteys employ called “white flight.“
It’s not the school, it’s the teachers. Great teachers should be rewarded. Not so great one should be let go.
The best school experience I ever had was in 3rd. grade in a Chicago public school.
We were expected to learn. I think we could have failed but I don’t remember anyone actually doing poorly.
Thank You! to all of the great teachers I’ve had.
Where’s Matt Foley, the great motivational speaker, when we need him? These underperforming students need to be frightened by the specter of living in a van down by the river.
Sounds like a good idea to me. Graduate…or else you will be here in school forever.
#13. Plenty of PhD graduates are already down there, to keep them company.
“The task is to change the reality, not the labeling of it,” said Alan Kazdin
All these little Brittneys and Brandons are going to be surprised to learn that this is not the system at most workplaces.
No do overs, no second chances. You fuck up, you lose your job, you get hungry fast (government work and CEO level jobs are the exception).
#12 Bill
Actually, it’s not the schools or the teachers it’s the kids (which really means it’s the parents).
These kind of “everybody wins / nobody loses” coddling programs are creating kids who, by highschool feel personally insulted when told they have failed at something. They complain to their parents “Mrs Smith Failed me!”. The parents in turn complain to the school or school board. Nobody is allowed to even consider the possibility that the kid is just a lazy spoiled asshole.
Based on the stories I have heard from my teacher friends, I would not consider a teaching job for anything under 6 figures.
Children aren’t clay to be molded, like everyone they all have qualities and defects of a hereditary nature. Show them good values and hope for the best is about all a parent can do. Unfortunately good values seem to be scarce these days.
What bullshit. Are all of you people incapable of thinking? The problem is NOT the kids. It is NOT the parents. It is NOT the teachers. It is NOT the Schools. It is the system.
We like the efficiency of mass production. All the parts are interchangeable. And so it is with education. The problem is, about 1/3 function well in the system. About 1/3 function, but not to their best. And about 1/3 don’t function well at all.
This worked very well prior to WWII when there was not that much requirement for book learning. The kids that couldn’t cope with the system dropped out and worked the farms or in industry.
Today though, we require a much higher educated population and these kids are forced to remain in school. Only we are still using the “One size fits all” approach to education. Very few children get the chance to try alternative education and for those that do they don’t get the credit for it.
It appears in this case that someone is trying to accommodate those students that don’t fit into the 2/3 that can cope with the current system.
its a by product of what the colleges are teaching
would-be teachers…who in time..got themselves into power positions of the dept of edu and gov positions..
bah…its not even worth commenting further…
another toe in the grave
-s