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Collier school district mulls program to keep kids in school
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NAPLES — Lely High School Principal Ken Fairbanks has talked to that student.
The student whose grades just didn’t cut it. The student who was held back.
He can recall a student who transferred to Lely High School from another Collier County school. The student was called a failure, a dummy or worse, and wasn’t motivated to move forward.
“He wasn’t connected to his core group,” Fairbanks said.
That’s why Fairbanks said he supports a new district policy that would allow high school students who fall behind to move on to the next grade level with their classmates.
District officials said it isn’t social promotion, but it will allow students to feel they are a members of their peer group while requiring them to complete the academic work needed to graduate.
The idea is called a zero progression plan. Under the new rule, which is scheduled to be voted on at the Collier County School Board meeting Thursday, a high school student would be allowed to advance from one grade level to the next based on the completion of a school year of attendance.
The student then will remain at the junior designation until the student has earned enough credits to meet the grade level classification to be a senior.
Under the current district policy, students must earn six credits to be a sophomore, 12 to be a junior and 18 to graduate while meeting the state minimum grade point average of 2.0. If students earned 5.5 credits, for example, he or she would be held back as a freshman, even though they had completed most of the work to become a sophomore.
Those credits can be made up, district officials said, from a variety of sources including online classes or credit recovery courses.
“We are saying that we want to help you, but in the end you have to take advantage of the opportunity to get the credits,” said Chief Instructional Officer Martha Hayes.
The new policy would remove the required credits for students who would graduate in the class of 2010 and beyond until the student became a junior.
Susan McNally, executive director of secondary programs, told the Collier County School Board that failing to pass freshman year increases the chances a student will drop out of school. She said the district hoped the program would remove barriers for those students and provide opportunities for them to succeed.
But district officials were quick to point out that the new policy was not the social promotion of students. Students would not be able to move beyond their junior year until they had earned enough credits to become a senior. Students will also not be able to graduate until they have completed all of the credits needed to graduate with the minimum grade point average.
The hope, district officials said, is that more students will continue with their high school education and graduate from Collier County schools. The district’s current graduation rate is 73.6 percent and the current dropout rate is 2.7 percent, according to the Collier County School District’s Web site.
“Kids who are 14 and 15 years old can’t predict the consequences of that action,” said Hayes of the decision to drop out. “What influences them the most are their friends and peers. When they don’t feel they fit in, it makes the desire to stay in school that much harder.”
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Good. At least that is one attempt to keep kids in school. Another attempt should be to hire teachers that can teach! The schoo system is filled with teachers that do not know how to teach. They pass an exam, get a certificate, and then think they can teach a class. Teaching is a lot like acting. You can learn it. It can come naturally. Or you just can't do it at all. There are too many teachers in the system who just can't do it at all.
The admin really needs to focus on hiring more teachers that know how to teach. Some people, no matter how much training, will never be good at teaching because they don't have the personality for it. If the admin did mock classes during interviews for teachers, it would be able to better weed out those teachers who just won't cut it. As it stands now, too many people are becoming teachers that don't have a clue!
#1 Posted by SmartyPantsIndependent on August 19, 2008 at 9:11 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I think smarty is right. Tracking a student with his/ her core group and calling it something else is the misapplied "compassion," maybe even sleaziness. Social promotion (by any other name) is grade school stuff.
Good teachers giving good classes is what students need and want.
#2 Posted by dwyerj1 on August 20, 2008 at 4:45 a.m. (Suggest removal)
zero progression plan is simply a numbers game - keep them in school (until the end) and get more money per student - BRILLIANT - but with this new schedule, exactly when will the students have time to "make up" the missed/failed class - NOT - Smoke and mirrors - don't be fooled, its all about the MONEY -
#3 Posted by muchwizernow on August 20, 2008 at 5:47 a.m. (Suggest removal)
First they started giving every kid in the soccer league a trophy whether they won or lost. Now you get to go ahead a grade if you fail, nice life lessons.
#4 Posted by kneejerk on August 20, 2008 at 8:19 a.m. (Suggest removal)
It sounded good but I thought that that was what summer school was for.
Welcome to Rockford South. According to Rockford students were being graduated who didn't have the credits.
#5 Posted by chincieone on August 20, 2008 at 8:43 a.m. (Suggest removal)
The county (and many others) needs to do is to have a teacher's salary that's attractive to the "best and brightest." Entry level salaries are between $31-36k (Bachelors to PhD). We all know this is just not enough money to live in Collier county (say Naples) without making some sacrifices like having roommates, etc. Largely then the teachers are of poor quality because the better quality ones found jobs elsewhere!
Money that could be spent on improving teacher's salary and quality of life is instead spent on buffoons like Ken Fairbanks to tell us we shouldn't fail kids that don't perform. I can't hit a 90 mph fastball, but that shouldn't stop me from going into the major leagues, right???
Alas our teachers are paid the same as an assistant manager for Best Buy -- and at least Best Buy is less political, less goody-2-shoes parents, less idiotic policy, etc.
#6 Posted by stahlight on August 20, 2008 at 10:35 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Stahlight,
More money does not make for better teachers. Being a good teacher has everything to do with ATTITUDE, not money.
If you start giving the teachers the money you think they deserve, the cost of living will raise so high that no one will be able to afford to live here.
There is nothing that says that anyone has the right to a 3 bedroom home right out of college. Small apartments and roomates are how many of us started out after college. Why should today's teachers (or any other profession) be any different?
#7 Posted by ke4ktz on August 20, 2008 at 12:01 p.m. (Suggest removal)
This all started when they began using the term "held back" instead of "failed".
Through the years I have noticed a softening of the language to imply that when one fails it is not the individuals fault.
#8 Posted by Neal on August 20, 2008 at 2:12 p.m. (Suggest removal)
This is mainly because of the FCAT. Lee County did this last year. It is harder for a retained student to show gains for the school.
#9 Posted by GoIndians on August 20, 2008 at 3:25 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Go Indians is correct - this is all about FCAT. Once a student has taken the 10th grade version of the FCAT three times, they can take the ACT or SAT and use that score in lieu of the FCAT to meet graduation requirements. There is a minimum score on the ACT or SAT that must be earned (state sets the score). Other districts in the state use the zero progression plan. Some students who struggle on the FCAT do pass with the ACT score.
#10 Posted by harley2 on August 20, 2008 at 4:59 p.m. (Suggest removal)
It really doesn't matter if you call a student "freshman" or "sophomore." The bottom line is, they must pass the required classes. We will just have a bunch of "juniors" taking Freshman English classes. (Actually, we already do!)
Oh, and Ken Fairbanks must really be the expert here. Lely HS was a D school 3 out of the last 4 years!
#11 Posted by GoodSense on August 20, 2008 at 5:26 p.m. (Suggest removal)
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