Why School Report Cards Merit A Failing Grade Essay

The function of the education system is to improve students education and prepare them for the real world. Students within that system should receive an “A” when they have mastered the information they are being taught. However, grades no longer accurately reflect how much students have learned. Since 1998 teachers have handed out more A-grades while the average SAT scores have actually fallen. In fact, as Greg Toppo states, an author for USA Today, the amount of A’s handed out actually went up close to ten percent (4). Students can manipulate their courses so that they can get good grades without actually learning much of anything. With grades not accurately representing what students have learned and charter schools failing to solve problehms, teachers need to change how they structure their class or grade assignments.

The gap between the nation’s best and worst public schools continues to grow. Our country is based on freedom and equality for all, yet in practice and in the spectrum of education this is rarely the case. We do not even have to step further than our own city and its public school system, which many media outlets have labeled “dysfunctional” and “in shambles.” At the same time, Montgomery County, located just northwest of the District in suburban Maryland, stands as one of the top school systems in the country. Within each of these systems, there are schools that excel and there are schools that consistently measure below average. Money alone can not erase this gap. While

Abernathy, Scott Franklin. No Child Left Behind and the Public Schools. U of Michigan P, 2007. eBook Academic Collection (EBSCOhost). In this eBook, Scott Franklin Abernathy, an Associate Professor of Political Science and a Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of Minnesota, presents a balanced critique of No Child Left Behind (NCLB). Abernathy argues that all policy makers must ask themselves “Can we ever really know if a child’s education is good?”, rather than assuming any test can accurately measure the elusive thing called a good education. Along with strengths and weakness of NCLB, Abernathy also presents many new models that law makers have been seeking to replace or use

Pragmaticism, indeed, will dictate that schools, assessments, and organizations long-established will not be altered for light and short-lived causes. Hence, a gradual shift in culture and method must occur which reforms the quantitative nature of grading systems. However, let the negative effects of the current grading system be known in a direct way:

The issue with identifying a single problem with the American education system is the extreme complexity of it. There are a number of factors that play into a student’s success. These factors include, but aren’t limited to: economic background, home life, teachers, family emphasis on education, administration, curriculum, and extracurricular activities. The film most often blames teachers for the prevailing problems with the education system. Most critics are quick to tell you that this is wrong; however one should not dismiss this idea so quickly. According to a study conducted by a Stanford economist named Eric Hanushek, teachers are accountable for up to twenty percent of a student’s success. Diane Ravitch, author of “The Myth of Charter Schools,” leads her readers to believe that this should absolve teachers from any wrongdoing. However, twenty percent is a considerable number, accounting for one fifth of a student’s success. Despite the numbers, teachers are an intricate part of the learning process. A great teacher can make or break you in the long run of really understanding the course

These tests will provide teachers and administrators a diagnosis of how the school is performing and in which areas the school needs to improve on. This will also inform policymakers which schools are doing well and why. Then that technique can be applied to schools in which the scores were not meeting standards. President Bush and the U.S. Congress have challenged educators to set high standards and hold students, schools and districts accountable for results. (Dept. of Ed, 2004)

In 1983, Ronald Reagan stood in front of the press and read from a report called A Nation at Risk: Imperative for Education Reform. The report had been written by the board of the National Commission on Excellence and Education and gave Americans reason to believe that our system was anything but acceptable. While the report did touch on some positives in American public schools, there were many instances that needed to be fixed. A Nation at Risk opened the eyes of many Americans and thus started a rolling stone for more “rigorous and measurable standards.” Although the notice has hung around school districts across the nation for over thirty

Introduced during the 1990’s, accountability is a newer term inside the education world. By definition, accountability holds, not only teachers, but districts, educators, and also students accountable for any results ("Accountability", 2004). Accountability hasn’t always been prominent inside our education. In fact, it wasn’t until the 1990’s when lawmakers began to flirt with the idea. Though accountability became increasingly popular during the end of the previous century, it does possess several roots which began in the 1950’s.

By believing that instructors are the most important influence in a child’s education, teachers are given an unrealistic responsibility. Many policymakers believe that holding educators accountable for student success is the best way to improve public education. This asks educators to overcome these outside variables that are far outside of teachers’ control. Policymakers suggested linking teacher evaluations to student achievement, measured by standardized tests. This is not a beneficial way to hold teachers accountable because of the many outside factors that affect student achievement. A better way to hold teachers accountable is to stem out of a realistic perspective on what teachers can and should do for their students. Each part of society holds an important responsibility in increasing student achievement. Teachers should not be asked to be responsible for more than they can handle.

In “Should US Colleges Be Graded by the Government?”, Haley Sweetland-Edwards discusses a plan made by President Obama to have colleges evaluated based on accessibility, affordability, graduation rates, and how students are performing after graduation. Sweetland-Edwards explains the possible negative consequences of this plan by explaining how certain details (such as athletics, performance by professors, and internship opportunities) may be ignored in favor of basic statistics. Sweetland-Edwards further explains how ratings for areas that are being evaluated may affect

Education in the United States has long been a concerned issue for teachers, parents, and communities. It is a major political topic, in which government has shown continuous efforts to compare and evaluate standards from state to state by creating and monitoring various programs for overall academic improvement across the country.

Many educators have seen The No Child Left Behind Act as both a success and an inadequacy. Introduced in 2001, the Act’s intention was to reform education at that time. It was a step in the right direction, however, like most things, it didn’t solve the problem.  The Act pushed education to seek standardized testing as the only mean to evaluate a school’s quality of education. In fact, Robert Rothman, Scott F. Marion, and Helen Ladd believe that education needs reform. They confront their different positions on the issue in two articles. Ladd’s article is more admirable than Rothman’s and Marion’s. Ladd fulfills her purpose for writing the article in a better manner than Rothman and Marion because she communicates the issue in a formal, but

The educational system in the United States has gone through many changes over the last century. These changes are a part of a constant movement toward educational excellence for every child in this nation. One of the most recent acts placed on public school systems by the government is to create more accountability for schools in order to ensure that all children are receiving the proper education. Part of this mandate is that public schools will require students to take tests in order to gather information about their academic achievement. Although educators and administrators claim that the mandatory ability testing programs being initiated in America’s public schools will hold students and teachers accountable for academic

system─ is on results. And while this focus on results is understandable (see, e.g., Schmoker, 1999, 2001), it is also important to consider the means by which the ends are achieved. The questions emerged: What was the effect of a political decision─ to demand public school accountability─ on pedagogical decision making? How might the demands of a new testing program affect how teacher teach and how children are expected to learn?

The American education system and its public institutions are slowly changing. What used to be a public institution is pushed to be a “publicly funded, but privately managed” system, also known as charter schools. The problem with charter schools development is due to the lack of enforcement is the results of insufficient measure of transparency and accountability. Due to the lack of oversight the public have over charter schools, this leads to many cases of fraud and abuse and no guarantee of academic advancement. Examples could be found in the lack of coherent data on the improvement of students performance, and case of fraud, both financially and academically, in many charter schools all over the nations. This overdue dispute raises concerning questions of what is the right and satisfying solution for the issue and how to guide state legislators and communities toward public accountability and transparency for charter schools.