Date: Fri 10-Apr-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: CURT

Quick Words:

commentary-powell-Kennelly

Full Text:

COMMENTARY: School Standards Scare Kennelly

By Chris Powell

US Rep Barbara B. Kennelly, the presumptive Democratic nominee for governor,

held a press conference at a school in Manchester the other day to declare

that "public education in Connecticut is mired in mediocrity" and lacks

standards. "In no academic subject is mastery of standards linked to

graduation or promotion," Kennelly noted.

That indeed is the central problem of education in Connecticut. Now all

Kennelly needs is the courage of her convictions. For the ineffectual remedies

she offered practically mocked her diagnosis.

Kennelly did not propose that students who fail the statewide mastery tests

given in fourth, sixth, and eighth grade should be denied promotion to the

next grade. She proposed that they just be given more remedial help, which is

only what they more or less get now. She also proposed that students who pass

the mastery tests be given membership in something called the Governor's

Mastery Club, as if that would be the crucial incentive for them to give up

their video games in favor of their studies.

Kennelly also proposed to create a new kind of high school diploma, a "mastery

diploma." It would be awarded to graduating seniors who had passed the mastery

test two years earlier, in tenth grade. It would certify to colleges and

prospective employers that the holders had a basic education and would entitle

them to free remedial education from the state if colleges or employers found

otherwise.

That is, under Kennelly's plan to end mediocrity in education in Connecticut,

even the best high school graduates still could be two grades behind when they

entered college or the work force. And what of the other high school

graduates, the ones who could not pass even the tenth-grade test? They would

continue to get ordinary diplomas that, being distinguishable from the

"mastery diplomas," would continue to certify what they already do: nothing.

Or maybe worse than nothing, since these diplomas now would signify that

Connecticut knowingly was allowing people to graduate from high school though

they could not do even tenth-grade work.

Nothing Kennelly proposed would do anything about the problem she identified:

"that in no academic subject is mastery of standards linked to graduation or

promotion." Everyone who failed would continue to be promoted and to graduate.

Of course politicians may shy away from this problem, for solving it requires

telling tens of thousands of parents and students in Connecticut that the

failure here is theirs just as much as the government's and that they

shouldn't be permitted to get away with it anymore. But to tiptoe up to the

problem only to run away from it in fright like this may be more embarrassing

than just ignoring it as most other politicians do.

(Chris Powell is managing editor of The Journal Inquirer in Manchester.)