New push seeks to end need for remedial classes before college - NYTimes.com

New Push Seeks to End Need for Remedial Classes Before College – NYTimes.com – Annotated

This story is from New York, but it could just as easily have been here in Mississippi or anywhere else around the country.It profiles one community college freshman faced with the now common problem of being placed in remediation for basic English even though she has just graduated with a diploma from high school. It highligts many important and disturbing issues about the lack of consistency in our educational system. Here are a few highlights from the article:

“The two systems don’t communicate well at all.” — What an understatement.​

“Even some high school honors students failed college placement exams and were assigned to her developmental courses, she said.

“Boy, were they surprised,” Ms. Manchin said.”

I had a niece in this situation. She had been a member of the high school honor society, and had taken honors English courses all the way through high school. Yet the state college wanted to put her in remedial English based on her ACT subscore for the English section of the test. This is disturbing when we have considerable documentation that these college entrance tests (ACT, SAT) are not good predictors of the performance of African American students in college settings. So why are colleges still making these decisions based on flawed information?

Anybody else see a connection between the high percentage of uncertified persons in this school and the dismal performance of its graduates who attempted college? Why do they even refer to these people as “teachers”? They’re just sitters.

How did it get like this and what should really be done about it?

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