Basics needed for success

One judge in California decided that the high school exit exam is discriminatory. Some of our high school seniors, he reasoned, were deprived of a proper education, were economically, socially, culturally, linguistically disadvantaged and that they were treated unfairly by requiring them to demonstrate an eighth-grade knowledge of math and English.

Taking together all school districts in California, the number of students who fail this exam is relatively small. Districts with heavy immigrant populations obviously suffer the most failures and so the question is raised: Should the state further lower the bar of high school graduation requirements to accommodate a functionally illiterate minority?

Thankfully the Superintendent of Public Instruction has intervened and the California Supreme Court is taking the time to review this lower court decision. By any measure, it's a bad decision and a potentially dangerous precedent that would render a high school diploma practically meaningless.

The continued influx of a non-English speaking population to this state has required major adjustments in how educators throughout the state dispense education. Rather than hold the line against steadily eroding standards, the state has responded to its changing demographics by steadily lowering the bar, and consequently lowering expectations for the young people, who we are sending out into the world.

We've lowered the bar enough. We need to stop tinkering with education and send a very strong message to all who come to this country that their choice of residence comes with a responsibility. Along with the economic opportunity that our country so richly offers, there is, or should be, an implicit understanding that we expect much of their children.

We in the educational community expect our parents to understand that their children's education is best served by a partnership that links family values with public education. We should settle for nothing less than basic literacy from our high school graduates, but neither should we close off paths of learning that serve the variety of students who come to us.

As it is now, kids who want to work more with their hands and less with computers are being stifled and frustrated by curriculums and state mandates that want to steer everybody along the same, university bound, path. We need to go back to educating the whole child, accenting both his/her apprehension as well as his/her aptitudes.