Another time of year is approaching and like years before I hate the pressure I have to put on my students. This is the week of the Advanced Placement Tests in many disciplines the College Board deems important. This is the week when all of my student’s work is tested to see if they are qualified to win a score of 4 or 5 out of ten. I hate this because all the motivation and interest I have attempted to instill in my students becomes drained because of a foolish test.

I read an article the other day about an “AP dropout”. I thought it would fit perfectly into a discussion about how standardized tests are destroying all levels of our education system.

I’M AN AP DROPOUT. When classmates in my Advanced Placement U.S. history course
take the AP exam Friday, I won’t be with them. When they pick up their pencils
and start filling in those little bubbles, I’ll be reading the words of George
Kennan, Lillian Hellman, Harry Truman and Paul Robeson — .for a paper I’m writing on the Cold War.

The problem with the AP program is that we don’t have time to really learn U.S.
history because we’re preparing for the exam. We race through the textbook,
cramming in the facts, a day on the Great Awakening, a week on the Civil War and
Reconstruction, a week on World War II, a week on the era from FDR to JFK, a day
on the civil rights movement — with nothing on transcendentalism, or the Harlem
Renaissance, or Albert Einstein. There is no time to write a paper. Bound by the exam, my history teacher wistfully
says we have to be ready in early May.

Sometimes I feel as if the College Board, which administers the AP program, is
haunting our history class — a long, gray, flat board with a clock on it
looming over us. Like an oracle, it tells us what is worth learning and how long
learning should take.

The overriding goal is to crack the AP test. That means taking a lot of practice
tests — week after week, filling in those bubbles in class. It means
researching past AP exams to predict what will be on the test. It means
answering model AP essay questions for homework. It means brute memorization. My
classmates ask: Will there be more questions on the American Revolution or World
War I? What do we really have to know about mercantilism? Their unspoken
question is: If I blow the AP test, can I still get into a good college?

In class, we cannot stray from the AP regimen. A few weeks ago, we were rushing
through the 1960s with lightning speed. The Vietnam War is a fog. Somehow the New Frontier turned into the Great
Society, which I always confuse with the New Freedom, the New Nationalism and
the New Federalism. And what does CORE stand for?

But what really caught my eye was something in the textbook about a 1970 women’s
liberation march down Fifth Avenue in New York, where some marchers burned their
bras. Why was it radical to burn a bra, I wondered? But there was no time for
this in class.

When the AP program originated in the early 1950s, the idea was to offer a rich
curriculum of advanced work, bridging the senior year of high school with
college. It was the brainchild of educators at colleges and prep schools, based
on two studies funded by the Ford Foundation. The Educational Testing Service
administered the first AP exams in 1954, with the College Board taking over in
1955. Today, the program promises a ticket to college admission and college
credits through its 37 "college-level" AP courses and exams (in 22 subject
areas), as diverse as physics and studio art, most taken by juniors.

But in applying to college, my classmates are learning that many schools grant
no AP credits at all — even for a perfect exam score of 5 — and others only
for some subjects. So, with nearly 1.4 million students worldwide taking 2.5
million AP exams in 2007 — 300,000 in U.S. history — the reality is becoming
clear: AP classes have simply become another credential for college admission.

Instead of studying history, we study for the AP exam. And along the way, our
education has come to resemble the production of Model Ts on Ford’s assembly
line, with the College Board cracking down by auditing AP syllabuses before
allowing schools to put the official AP trademark on student transcripts.

So I became an AP dropout; and I’m not alone. According to Education Week, since
2006, more than 2,000 high schools across the country and around the world have
dropped the AP curriculum to march to their own drummers.

Meanwhile, freed from the AP regime as the exam approached, I slowed down to do independent research.

Sometimes I wonder how I would do on the AP exam — but not for long. As an AP
dropout, I hope to go to college on a road more meandering and slowly traveled.

Tom Stanley-Becker is a junior at the University of Chicago’s University High
School and an editor on his school paper, the Midway.

Forget standardized tests. The last report on how well President Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” program clearly demonstrates how our children’s capacity to read and comprehend what they are reading has not increased over the tenure of NCLB. Once again this under-funded education policy has nothing to do with success and has everything to do with politics and beaurocracy. The concept that a standardized test can force our nation’s schools to succeed in educating our children is a failed one.

For the past few months I have talked about how this program is failing our children. This is an easy thing to do. It is more difficult to try and find solutions that will make our schools stronger. Last year, Dartmouth College and Dartmouth Hitchcock Hospital in New Hampshire contacted me and asked if I would be interested in working with them on public care issues that was financially supported by a grant from Howard Hughes Medical Institute. I told them I would be interested in working with them on the grant.

Working with the Dartmouth people I discovered that many grants offered by the National Science Foundation and privately funded organizations striving to motivate our students toward science and mathematics has community outreach aspects written into the grant itself. In other words, many colleges and universities can only have access to federal or private grant money if they reach out to their communities. What could be a better way to motivate my students than to get them interested in state-of-the-art activities at some of our more prestigious colleges and universities?

Using the Dartmouth Grant I connected my anatomy & physiology students with Beth Israel Hospital, which is the teaching hospital for Harvard University. At the hospital they were able to tour a brand new pulmonary unit, watch a pulmonary procedure on cancer patients via video feed and work with life-sized, anatomically correct robot like-simulated patients. There were no tests after this experience. No multiple choice questions to see if they learned what some instructor, politician, or national testing company deemed they should know. They were simply motivated to study for their future in a science they thought interesting.

It is critical to get our students motivated early. Working with Boston University Medical School’s City Lab I sent down 40 sixth and seventh graders to study biotechnology. They worked with sickle cell anemia and forensics. They used micro-pipettes and electrophoresis tables in order to become enthralled in a science that will become a part of all their lives. Like the anatomy students there were no tests to be taken, no comparisons to other schools, and no threat of taking funds away. There was only learning taking place. Learning that will evolve into motivation that will evolve into a future for both themselves and their society.

There are many National Science Foundation studies going on in all of the states of our nation desperately trying to motivate our young to go into science and mathematics. Nano-technology or the study of very small things is the new science spreading through most of our universities and industries. The philosophy of our public education system should be all about getting institutions of higher learning to expose our kids to real life scientific experiences and get them charged up about science. The concept that standardized tests will save our public education system is and should be dead. By the way, all of these programs do not cost the tax payers a dime. All the schools have to do is give their teachers time to promote the programs. They can get this time by scrapping the concept of teaching to a test that means absolutely nothing.

As a teacher and citizen of our nation I was taken aback by the reverend’s speech last night. His concepts that African-American students learn in different ways was created out of fantasy. He talked about right-brained Afro-Americans and left-brained Europeans. I have taught for well over a quarter of a century and have enjoyed many Afro-American students who had wonderfully objective minds and who succeeded in math and the sciences. I have also enjoyed many Caucasian students who achieved success in literature and art. This idea there is something genetic that makes a child think the same way is nonsense.

What would Reverend Wright say about the Chinese culture or the Latino child? Does he believe everyone in Africa because they were born on that continent all learn the same way? Do North African children all have subjective minds as do South African children? Does Reverend Wright believe English students are the same as Italian students? If anyone has enjoyed Europe they understand these are two very different cultures.

As a citizen I was shocked by how Reverend Wright spoke of division in our nation. I was on the fence as to who to support in this upcoming election. I was impressed by Barak Obama’s statement that, “There is no blue America or Red America. There is only the United States of America.” Hearing Reverend Wright’s speech it is obvious the people who surround Barak Obama do not believe what he is saying.

I believe all who are not Afro-American in my nation should fear this philosophy of Reverend Wright and should come to the conclusion this nation is not ready for an Afro-American President. The part of the nation I am talking about is Afro-American.

Looking through volumes of instructional materials supplied by the state in order to teach the teacher how to teach his or her students to a test so they can be spared from the wrath of NCLB I took some time to see what the state and thus NCLB wants us to teach our students. One of the things I noticed was that there was little to no state-of-the-art concepts that, in the past, have always motivated my students.

Since I teach chemistry I am talking about the science portion of the test. Science by definition is embedded in the concept of finding new and exciting topics that will inspire my students to want to learn more. I don’t want to have a discussion about the English or mathematics portion of the test because I ignorantly assume their disciplines have changed little in the past half-century. Science, on the other hand, changes all the time.

Reading through what this newest of “Big Brothers” want us to teach our students I found very few concepts that would excite my students. For example, the new technology in our society has to do with nanotechnology. This is the science of very small things. Twenty or so years ago when my students asked what they should go into I would tell them computer science. Ten or so years ago if my students asked the same thing I would tell them biotechnology. Today, when my students seek my advice as to what industry is destined to grow I tell them nanotechnology. But, the test doesn’t even touch any of these subjects. They continue to test basics that only lead to antiquated disciplines that are far away from anything my students will see in their futures.

The problem is not with the test. The problem is how the NCLB is forcing our students to teach to the test. This bleeds time in which the teacher can motivate their students toward science. By drilling for a test the teacher eliminates any possibility of exciting their students to want to learn more.

In fact, in order to show success many of the state science tests have made their activity so generic that it is foolish. For example, I have been advised to not teach cell theory and the parts of the cell in the middle school years because I am told the students are not old enough to understand the concepts of structure and function. I argue the middle school years are the time to get our students excited about what they will experience in their high school years. If you wait too long the students will be bored out of science. My arguments are ignored because the successful completion of the test is more important than the successful education of our students.

We had a bomb scare at my school the other day. In fact, it was on the anniversary of the Virginia Tech murders. The day was totally disrupted by a person or persons who decided no one at my school had the right to an education. We followed policy best we could with the entire school being taken to a field behind the school. The younger students were then brought to the elementary school with the high school students transported to the basement of the town hall.

For the next few hours I observed something I never thought I would see. Many of the students showed little to no respect for their teachers. I watched how young female teachers were sneered at and literally pushed around. I noticed many male teachers who hours before were working hard in order to have their students succeed were now told off because their students thought they had no idea as to what to do. Finally after the students were released many of my colleagues were dismayed because they thought they at least had some value to their students. Many asked why our profession has dipped this low over the past decade or so. Seeing that everyone was depressed I decided to open my much-too-large mouth and explain the reality we just experienced was not our fault. It is the fault of how our profession is being condemned by the media because over the past decade or so it has reported that the public education system in our nation is failing. How else should our students view us. For after all, we are only teachers.

I then told a story I had written many years ago when I started to feel the respect I had as a teacher began to diminish. It is one of my favorite stories I wish would go away.

I had a great day…..

….. yesterday. But, even the greatest of days doesn’t make it any easier to get up at 5:00 in the morning. If only I could get to bed before 11:00 PM on school nights. That would make my life so much easier. With mountains of correcting being precipitated every day that possibility is basically impossible. So here I am, shocking myself awake with a cold shower so I can stay alert for the approaching new day.

My wife gets up every morning with me and takes the opportunity to share some conversation over a cup of coffee. We both cherish this time together because other than our morning conversations we spend too little time together. After a few minutes I say my good-byes

I’m off to work before 6:30 AM because it is critical to arrive at school at least 45 minutes early to complete any final preparations for my classes and to see if there are any further reports due from either the administration or the many guidance and special education departments. Some mornings I have students waiting for me with questions concerning the work that is due or was done the day before. I’ve been told the many reports and questionnaires are a necessary tool. But, they take up too much of my time. They seem so redundant and most of the time they probably either get filed or thrown away.

I run down to the teacher’s room to make some copies of problem sheets to be worked on by some of my classes. The copy machine usually doesn’t work and there is never enough paper to complete the task. I once complained to the main office and was told I use too much paper. I should try to conserve on supplies because the town’s people are threatening to lower next year’s supply budget; again. I try to explain I use a lot of copying material because I don’t have enough text or lab books in some of my classes. By this time the office decides to ignore me for, after all, I am only a teacher.

The busses arrive. In come the numerous students ranging from age 12 to 21. Their entrance is noisier than a Fenway Park crowd. They are young and youth by definition is synonymous with energy and vitality. The school day begins with attendance and the Pledge of Allegiance being recited. Most students do not attempt to stop their conversations until half way through the pledge. They just don’t see why they should be bothered. I explain the pledge is recited to honor the many men and women of our nation’s past and present who lost their lives defending our freedoms. They look at me but don’t hear me for after all, I am only a teacher.

My classes begin with a review of what we had covered the previous day. Most of my students now begin to pay attention but I always see through their eyes they would rather be somewhere else. They don’t understand why they are being forced to learn something they think they will never use and probably soon forget.

Looking around my room I see many of my student’s eyes begin to half close. I used to think my teaching style put many of them to sleep. After many meetings with guidance and special education departments I discovered most of these students have full time jobs after school. Some students openly rebel by refusing to waste their time studying something they feel is useless. I try to explain that in their futures they will appreciate understanding various ideas and concepts so they can successfully make correct decisions in their lives. Most of the time I get comments about how an education is not worth anything except maybe for the fact they can make more money if they graduate. They sometimes even bring up articles describing how the schools are bankrupting the towns and why a cut back in funding is necessary. They ask me why they should believe education is important when their own parents believe education is not worth their tax dollars.

I continue to explain money is not an end to life but a means. Understanding is more important than how much they can make because, in reality, money is an empty goal. I tell them an intellectual life creates a happier life-style because it fulfills why we are here. By now most of my students sneer at this explanation because they see what happened to me by choosing an intellectual life. I became only a teacher.

Every year I have more and more students sincerely believe they will not have the future their parents had because if the terrorists don’t kill them, the growing public debt will eliminate any chance they had to attain a good life. These are the students who argue if one doesn’t take the opportunity to live for today, they will never experience life. They have a difficult time delineating between their present and their future.

A few days ago I met an extremely angry student. His language was fowl and his actions were aggressive. He wasn’t one of my students but I was asked by a new teacher to help her with this particular class. His language horrified me and when I told him it was extremely inappropriate he became violent. He finally left the room but before he did he looked back at me in disgust. What right did I have to delineate between what was appropriate and what was not. For after all, I am only a teacher.

Lunch is rarely experienced. I only have a few minutes left of the thirty-minute block I am allotted because it is necessary for me to set up my afternoon classes. Instead of eating I go to my mailbox to find numerous questionnaires concerning special needs students. These are the students I feel the most compassion for. They are never allowed to be free of the label they came into school with. I once asked one of the special needs teachers if any of their students evolved into becoming fully mainstreamed. I never received an answer. My frustration erupts when I am able to finally challenge these young men and women only to be told that I am not following their IEP’s (individual education plan) and I am not going along with the program as instructed. I sincerely believe that these students yearn to be challenged like their peers and would love to have their title of “special” put into their past.

Some days I get letters from parents of “overachieving” students asking why their child is not doing well in my class. Why I am not able to earn the money paid to me by correctly teaching their child. I try to explain students in many of my classes are being challenged and the constant perfect grades enjoyed by their children in earlier grades are not attainable in the higher grades. I also explain to many a parent their children can’t be perfect in everything they do. I once told a parent that pure perfection is synonymous with nothing. Some are better in English than math and vice-versa. These parents never leave convinced of my arguments. One of my favorite paraphrases is that “high potential is the heaviest baggage a young person can carry.”

A day never passes when I don’t see one or more of my students with their eyes dilated because of some drug or alcohol abuse. I desperately try to reach these children in hopes I can convince them to leave their bodies alone and give their minds a chance. They rarely answer me and only turn away for after all I am only a teacher. Many of my older colleagues state our profession has become less teaching and more social work. If this is what it has to be, so be it. For we are the only people left that can help these children. After we are gone, society’s enforcement systems take over.

If I ever turn to the administration for help with these students, this only succeeds in having them suspended or expelled from school. This separates them from any possible help. But, on the other hand, I can’t blame the administration for trying to protect the whole from the few. They are being perpetually frustrated in this cause because the state demands we educate all of the youths in the community even if this means putting other children at risk.

The day ends like it began with my students displaying the same amounts of energy they showed when they arrived. I look around my room and see various pieces of crushed paper on the floor and in the desks. I know I can’t dally because I usually have a faculty meeting or a department meeting that, as of late, discusses the deep cuts in our budgets. School boards across the state and the country exclaim their towns can no longer budget any more money into education. There are more important things that the towns must budget for. There just isn’t any more money.

As I finish cleaning my room and the last of my students leave from extra help, one of my students enters and explains what I taught her about biological relationships between young men and women made a decision she had to make easier. As she was leaving my room she turned and thanked me for being a teacher; her teacher.

I had a great day …..

Most people simply don’t get it. The only way they equate whether or not their child is receiving a good education is by seeing how well their school does on a standardized test. The other day my school had its fourth series of tests given to freshman level students. Each test was supposed to last an hour but when I wandered into my room of which was taken away because of the tests I noticed every one of the students had finished the test within 15 minutes. It is obvious they don’t care and I don’t blame them. For how many times can they be taken out of their classrooms and put into a situation they don’t understand or care to understand.

When are people going to understand that in order to have a school or a teacher be accountable for what they do the parents of the students have to get involved with the education of their children. In order to have accountability mean anything the parents have to see their children evolve through the system understanding the concepts of what their teachers are trying to teach them.

The standardized tests simply demonstrate what some foreign source thinks the whole population of a school or even a state should know. They have no knowledge of the children or care to have any. They have no concept to the fact all children are not the same? They have no concept to the fact different children have different talents and different interests. All the test giver cares about is data showing their tests succeed instead of data asking how more children can succeed. In other words, more children are being left behind by a system that was supposed to protect them. If you don’t believe me just look at data across our nation showing more and more schools are failing.

Finally I can’t understand how taking a student out of my class will help the student with their education. I have a curriculum I follow that is based on state’s standards. Some of these standards are repeated over and over again in order to show some volume to their work. Some of the standards are so ambiguous many in education don’t have a clue as to what they stand for but I am told I have to follow this source even though I am famous for sneaking in as much content as possible. I am proud to say my students have no idea as to what ED.33CS.I means but they understand concepts that will help them in their future.

Next week I am being taken out of my classroom and away from my students because I have to be trained as to how to give the test. In other words, I have to stop teaching my students in order to be taught how to give a test I clearly understand has no value. I assume most people don’t get this because they are either too busy or simply don’t care. I guess it is easy to read a report in a newspaper instead of becoming involved in the education and thus the life of their children. This is something I will never get.

The news reports make it absolutely clear our government’s NCLB program is a total failure. All of our metropolitan areas now have less than 50% of our children graduating from high school. Actually there are some that have less than 40% graduating. It is also obvious the ones that graduate have few of the skills we were allowed to give our students a few decades ago. The failure of this program could not be clearer. When we spend more time concentrating on a test that means absolutely nothing the only people who are destined to fail are our children and thus all of us.

As a teacher I am sick and tired of being blamed for the failures of people who are supposed to administrate our public education system. I no longer concentrate on curriculums that will help my students because I am forced to focus on systems that only enhance this system of accountability instead of helping my students. I believe all teachers should be accountable for their students; not for the tests produced by people who have no idea of what teaching is.

People in this country should be outraged at the politicians who attempt to empower themselves by conning the citizens of our country that their cute little programs will save our education system. It is so remarkably clear we have to get back to the basics of a system that was envied by the entire world. Content has to be favored over process. The reality that not everyone is capable of doing the same work has to be realized. All of our students do not have the capacity to understand Calculus. All of our students do not have the capacity to understand “War and Peace”. All of our students do not have the capacity to understand art or music. All of our students do not have the capacity to understand how a fuel injection system works. We have to stop this foolishness of thinking all of American students are capable of doing the same things.

Our children have intrinsic talents. They do not have to be the same. Our present system of public education not only diminishes these talents but it tries to make them all the same thus making them all less than average. This “mannilafication” of public education has to change if we have any chance of competing in the new reality of global societies.

As a teacher I am outraged by the present concept of what public education should be. As parents you should all be disgusted.  

This is the time of year when the test companies across our nation make their most money. Most of our students are dragged out of their classrooms in order to see if their time in our classroom was worth while. If the student does not do well they are told they have to take more tests in order to do well on THE test. Our curriculums are then changed in order for our students to do well on a test that has little to do with their dreams or aspirations of their future. Originally this test was proposed to be used as a tool for educators to improve instruction. Today, with results being headlined in all of our local papers the tests are simply being used as a showcase showing how our public education system is failing. The truth is the NCLB program is not only failing our children it is also eliminating the concept of motivating our students toward success.

But, how can we improve the abilities of our students? I believe we should get the parents more involved. When I bring this point up many in administrative capacities give me that odd look insinuating having parents more involved is an impossible task. As far as most teachers are concerned it is the only way public education can prepare their children for a future that will be different from what their parents experienced. In fact, this is probably the first generation where the parents will be better off than the children. This is simply a statement of fact but the only way we can improve their lot is to make sure they have the best possible education.

I once proposed having parents sign a contract with the school promising they will not only help their child but will also take part in the lessons. They, like their children will be graded according to the on-going curriculum. If the parent fails they will have to go through further remedial studies ensuring they will be able to keep up with and thus help their children.

When I brought this scenario to my administration I was basically laughed at. I was told no parent would agree to be graded as part of their child’s education. Pushing the issue I stated that all parents did not have to become a part of this program. They could make the decision not to join this class of students. But, the parents and students who do will be in a class by themselves. This would be analogous to heterogeneous groupings of students according to their academic ability. I was again told this would never work. I was even told this would be illegal.

I disagree. For our nation to have any future in a global society we need to have them prepared for what the future has in store for them. Curriculums based on inquiry and hands on activities have not worked because it eliminates content. Testing your students in order to have them show they are successful is destined to fail because no test could possibly judge a students heart and need to be motivated toward a particular discipline. For after all what student does not want to succeed. By testing them over and over again all we are showing them is that they can’t succeed.

This is the time of year when the test companies across our nation make their most money. I propose we permanently put these companies out of business and use the money to fix and thus promote public education by including all the parents that care.

Inquiry is defined by Webster as being,” a request for information and a search for truth or knowledge. He goes on to describe the concept of being, “a systematic investigation of a matter of public interest.” The reason I bring up this definition is this is the time of our school year when our federal government mandates tests in order to find out if our students learned anything. This is also the time when the teachers are basically tested to see if they are accountable to what they try to do.

Many science curriculums are based on this concept of inquiry. They had to do this because many of the state science exams are based on the same principle. To the non-teacher this sounds like a wonderful idea and as its definition implies it is. The problem is the idea of inquiry had the content of what we were supposed to teach evolve into the process of how we taught it. This also sounds like a good idea but when the process overwhelms the content you basically lose the idea of teaching and learning because it is replaced by entertainment.

In my many decades of teaching I have watched new teachers evolve from sages on a stage to facilitators of fun. I have observed how students are now allowed to wander around the room during the class. I am told it lessons the stress of the class. I wonder how any instruction can take place in a class that does not pay attention to the instructor. But, remember I am a dinosaur.

I once observed a math class in which students were taught algebra by standing and using their arms and legs to simulate the variable “x”. They then stood in a line in order to construct an equation. The whole process took about 20 minutes. I could have done this on a chalk board in 20 seconds. I also saw there was no right or wrong answers since each of the students has a unique brain and therefore the right to define reality. Since I teach chemistry I may want to keep these specific students away from my laboratory.

During a seminar on inquiry based learning I kidded with a colleague by asking if the students were to learn anatomy and physiology by doing hands on examinations. My young colleague did not understand the joke. He then went on to tell me how during his biology class students used simple jingles, rhymes, and adages to learn human anatomy. In my mind’s eye I saw myself running out of an operating room after I heard my surgeon start to sing.

Since this is also a time of year where school budgets are produced I learned that more money is spent on poster boards and on arts supplies than on books. Technology has gotten away from programs that instruct content to now becoming more like video games. Singing and dancing have become a part of every academic subject’s curriculum. I actually tried that once. I played music as my students were entering my class. They asked me never to do that again because they told me it scared them.

The most terrifying part of inquiry based learning is it is happening in all of our schools. The concept of how a student feels about his or her learning is more important than what is actually learned. An argument for this is the teacher should be trying to produce life-long learners. As a dinosaur I would like to produce an intelligent human being who is motivated to learn more about what I planted the seed in the first place.

So this is the time of year when I have to take my students out of my classroom in order to show our government they can learn through inquiry based standards. I just hope there is some content involved in the tests. I also hope singing and dancing are not a part of the test because it will scare the heck out of my students again.

For the past few months I have been discussing how we can improve public education. I am calling myself a dinosaur because I have been in this business for about over a quarter of a century and I know I don’t have much time left to defend what I believe is the most important issue facing us all. It is well known that without an educated society it will be impossible to retain a free society.

I received the following E-mail from one of my students. I believe it highlighted an important issue that is affecting all of our children across the nation. The mailing read as follows:

 
”I was with a friend today in Portsmouth and she mentioned she has come across some of your writing in various publications.  Curious, I Google’d your name and the first thing that came up was your blog.  I was highly impressed by your arguments regarding NCLB from a teacher’s standpoint.  While I believe it is good that there is at least some educational program, I don’t believe NCLB has done much in terms of positively benefiting students.  It was great to read about the topic from various teachers’ perspectives; as a student I speak for all of us that although we are a different group of people (students vs. teachers), there are many unnecessary stresses that frequently overwhelm students including myself that I now believe would be relieved had NCLB never existed.

Anyway, what I was interested in asking you was what you thought of the gradual nonexistence of music education in schools.  The elimination of our school’s Jazz Band this year was a deep blow to me and many of my friends and fellow band mates who participated in that group with me last year.  When I inquired several times to my guidance director and principal; in fact, I even met privately with her once searching for answers on why this course was cut and if it would ever be brought back, I was answered in a split second with a different excuse each time.  This left me with the vibe that perhaps Music is not considered at all a priority by our administration, and perhaps administrations in other districts.  I was legitimately saddened and disgusted by this.  As a student who really hopes to minor in Music in my post-high school education, I feel like I am being cheated out of my educational opportunities and interests at Newmarket with the new budget cuts to the Music department that my music director recently told me about.  He, who I had never encountered in an unhappy mood, was visibly bummed out when this discussion took place.  I can’t even imagine how he, one of the most professional and easy-going musicians I have studied under, must feel regarding this.  It would really be interesting to read a faculty member’s take on this issue.”

As professionals we all get caught up in the concepts of accountability, testing, NCLB programs, vouchers, and whatever other program we believe could save our public education system. But, maybe it is time to listen to the people this education system is supposed to serve. Maybe we need some time to stay quiet so we can hear their words.