Less than 2.3 percent of seniors won't graduate
The state released its almost final numbers yesterday on the number of students who won't meet the high school assessment requirement and will fail to graduate. I have a story in today's paper. There are lots more kids who have been lost along the way during the process of moving from ninth to 12th grade, but these are the students held back by just the HSAs.
The news was remarkably good in the eyes of Nancy Grasmick and the state board members, some of whom breathed a sigh of relief. Mary Kay Finan, a board member, said, "The impact of the HSAs was not as detrimental as we thought it would be." Back in the fall, she said, it looked as though there were going to be 9,000 to 10,000 who weren't going to graduate.
What still hasn't been revealed is the number of students who may have been overwhelmed by the process of passing the tests or doing the projects. Caught in a school that wasn't giving them encouragement or support, they may simply have decided not to come back over last summer.
Or maybe they just dropped out during this school year. And we also don't know whether the dropout rate will rise.
I wonder if any of our regular readers know of students who haven't made it? How do they feel?
On the other hand, I would like to hear from teachers and principals about what they see as the next step in the process of making high school better for students.
Baltimoresun.com's 
Comments
The students at my school who are not graduating failed other things besides the HSA requirement. One of the big stumbling blocks continues to be community service hours. Why is it that other systems seem to be able to build in community service in the 6-8th grades so that high school students don't have to worry with that issue? Surely someone in charge of the middle school programs could figure out a way to get some community service projects built into the curriculum. Baltimore County, Harford County, Carroll County all manage to do it. Ain't rocket science! And, yes, most of the failures are African-American and special education because that is where the need is greatest. That leads to the observation that special education students really shouldn't be counted in the cohort for graduation as, by law, they can stay in school and finish work until they are 21. Guess no one wants to recognize that part either. Let's celebrate the students who did finish and finish in a timely and consistent manner. Go Class of '09!!!
Posted by: vetern teacher | May 28, 2009 9:17 PM
One aspect the story didn't cover was the fact that the format of the HSAs was changed this year to be entirely multiple choice. With the writing portion of the tests removed, this made them a good bit easier to pass. That is a significant aspect that has not been communucated.
Posted by: Anonymous | May 29, 2009 3:07 PM
I have to note after reading the last comment that most of the students who pushed through this year didn't do so by passing each HSA. They did by either getting the combined score of 1602, or by completing bridge projects, both of which were alternate options to graduation.
If we still had the stringent requirements that were in place two years ago, the graduation rate would be absolutely as low as it was. The bridge projects can be copied as a teacher does them, and a lot of students who scored miserably on the test passed with the projects.
I would like to see the HSA be- gasp!- a bit easier, because I think a lot of the questions are more than you need to be a successful citizens (Federal Reserve functions, anyone? I didn't learn that in high school.) But I do think that every student should be held up to that standard, or get an alternate to a diploma.
Posted by: Katie | May 29, 2009 5:16 PM
I don't think there's any evidence that removing the writing makes things easier. In fact, at our school in Baltimore City, we're really worried about the tests a lot more now that the writing is removed. Writing, I think, gives kids more credit for things they know, instead of penalizing them for what they don't know; additionally, many students do not do well on standardized tests that feature multiple choice. I also think it's much harder to help students prepare for multiple choice questions than it is to help them prepare for writing, which is much more of a transferable skill.
Now, if the elimination of writing is paired with makign the multiple choice questions easier, then this could be true - that the tests will be easier. As it is, though, they've eliminated the part that at least our students have done the best on historically.
I think it's a big bummer that writing has been eliminated, that's for sure, even though I don't think it makes the tests easier for the students - just easier to score.
Posted by: bmoreteach | May 30, 2009 12:00 PM