I don't know about doing away with them.....While I do not like the "teaching to the tests" thing that tends to go on IMHO the teachers(schools) need some sort of benchmark to measure there preformance.Originally Posted by R13
IMHO schools need some sort of metric to hold them accountable
They do need to do away with the SOL's....the CAT test is adequate for analyzing students overall knowledge. If they want an exit exam, fine, but a good portion of the SOLs are useless information anyways. Furthermore, they limit the time a teacher can spend on teaching things that will actually be useful to his or her students later on in life.
...And if you ain't down with that, I got 2 words for ya....
Suprbeast already said it best, hit the nail on the head.
It seems like a good idea and maybe something like that would be useful, but it's all screwed up. The teachers have to focus on the SOL's, which they aren't really given that much to study by, towards the end they got some actual samples from it...before, it was the packets called "Flanagan" which are pretty much useless. The never covered what would be on the SOL, so it served no purpose, plus those things had errors that students were pointing out left and right.
The second part is, the students just don't care about anything they are taught unless it's on the SOL. Most lessons, after every lecture, the teacher was asked by someone if this would be on the SOL...if they said "probably", it was written down and studied..if not, they just didn't care. The teachers can't teach what they need/want to be taught, it's all focused on what will be on the big test. And again, the students don't care unless it's going to be on it too. Final exams are what has always or what should be the benchmark, an SOL really isn't needed and the teacher can cover what they want the students to learn. Problem is, a lot of classes have both final exam and SOL, a lot to cover because they're nowheres near the same..and fail either, you fail the class. That's a whole lot of pressure for anyone.
In Hawaii, school's out for recession
AP
By MARK NIESSE, Associated Press Writer Mark Niesse, Associated Press Writer ? Mon Oct 19, 2:24 pm ET
HONOLULU ? At a time when President Barack Obama is pushing for more time in the classroom, his home state has created the nation's shortest school year under a new union contract that closes schools on most Fridays for the remainder of the academic calendar.
The deal whacks 17 days from the school year for budget-cutting reasons and has education advocates incensed that Hawaii is drastically cutting the academic calendar at a time when it already ranks near the bottom in national educational achievement.
While many school districts have laid off or furloughed teachers, reduced pay and planning days and otherwise cut costs, Hawaii's 171,000 public schools students now find themselves with only 163 instructional days, compared with 180 in most districts in the U.S.
"The 16-year-old in me is pretty excited that I'll be able to chill on those days," said Mark Aoki, a junior at Roosevelt High in Honolulu. "But overall within me, what I truly believe is that we'll regret this."
The cuts come as Obama, who graduated from a top private high school in Hawaii, says U.S. students are at a disadvantage with other students around the world because they spend too little time in school.
He wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go. He declared recently that "the challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom."
The deal in Hawaii and has parents and education authorities up in arms, including families now scrambling to find day care for the off days. Parents of special-needs students are considering suing the state, and advocates believe the plan will have a "disparate impact" on poor families, ethnic communities and single parents.
"It's just not enough time for the kids to learn," said Valerie Sonoda, president of the Hawaii State Parent Teacher Student Association. "I'm getting hundreds of calls and e-mails. They all have the same underlying concern, and that is the educational hours of the kids."
The new contract, approved by 81 percent of voting teachers, stipulates 17 furlough Fridays during which schools will be closed, with the first happening Oct. 23. The teachers accepted a concurrent pay reduction of about 8 percent, but teacher vacation, nine paid holidays and six teacher planning days are left untouched.
The new agreement also guarantees no layoffs for two years and postpones the implementation of random drug testing for teachers.
Teachers probably wouldn't have voted for the contract if they had to work the same amount for less pay, paving the way for the shorter school year, said Hawaii State Teachers Association President Wil Okabe. He also said the state couldn't get the necessary savings if teacher furlough days were scheduled for holidays ? or workdays with schools kept open.
Hawaii has the nation's only statewide school district, meaning that state government pays directly for education instead of self-supporting local school districts.
More than a quarter of the state's general budget goes to the state Department of Education. When Republican Gov. Linda Lingle attempted to balance the budget, she withheld 14 percent from estimated salaries, or $227 million, this year from the public school system.
Hawaii Schools Superintendent Pat Hamamoto acknowledges that learning time will be lost and students will suffer, but she says schools will try to increase their efforts during the remaining school days to cram in as much teaching as they can.
"If we're trying to say education is the most important thing, then we should be supporting it," said Superintendent Pat Hamamoto.
The cuts are occurring in a Hawaii public education system that's already ranked 47th in the nation in eighth-grade reading and math, according to 2007 National Assessment of Educational Progress test scores.
"The less time spent on a task, the less likely it is that you're going to achieve," said Jack Jennings, president of the Washington-based Center on Education Policy. "Instructional time is usually the last thing to go in these budget crises."
Meanwhile, a record number of schools this year failed to meet progress goals under the federal No Child Left Behind law. Only 34 percent of schools met their "adequate yearly progress" goals this year. Two-third of schools missed the benchmarks. This was the second year of dramatic increases in the number of schools failing to meet the federal goals.
But state test score results have inched up. About 65 percent of students are proficient in reading, compared with 39 percent when testing began in 2002. Likewise, 44 percent of students demonstrated proficiency in math, more than double the 19 percent in 2002.
At least 25 states have made cuts to K-12 education, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. School districts in states including California, Florida, New Mexico are forcing teachers to take unpaid days off, but most of those furloughs are not on school days and they're usually limited to fewer than five days annually.
And none of those local school district furloughs are on the scale of Hawaii's, which employs 13,000 teachers.
At 163 school days, Hawaii's school year ranks behind every other state. Most states provide students with 180 days of school, while 10 other states offer less than 180 days, according to the Education Commission of the States.
___
On the Net:
Hawaii Department of Education: Hawaii Public Schools
Hawaii State Teachers Association: HSTA - Hawaii State Teachers Association
Hawaii State Parent Teacher Student Association: Hawaii State PTSA
In Hawaii, school's out for recession - Yahoo! News
** This is odd considering he wants to have more school days**
Well he has no power in Hawaii and never has. This makes sense, since they depend on a lot of tourism which has been lacking because of the economy...plus the unusual way their school system runs. With that said, this is dumb and the last thing they need...if money is the problem, take a small cut somewheres else but not to something this important.
Jost out of curiosity, how many students has the SOL's actually helped instead of hurting them? I know that in most Virginia colleges and universities, the professors all say that the SOL's have actually hurt the students because they are not learning anything.
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