More on the BMI Law March 9, 2008
Posted by Daniel Dage in Ed Policy Discussion, Parents and parenting.comments closed
I’ve been thinking about whatever the people at the capital were smoking and drinking when they passed the SHAPE bill. While thinking about it, I heard this odd “ring-a-ling-ling” outside my window along with some sort of weird music. I looked outside, and there was a white van slowly driving around the neighborhood, and then it drove on to the next neighborhood. Then it came back. It was the ice cream van. The strategy is simple: ring the bell, play silly music and roll through so all the kids see and hear you, then drive off. By the time you get back, the kids will have begged the parents for money or raided their piggy banks and will be waiting. This took place early in the evening, after school.
Most of the waking hours of children are spent away from school. While it is certainly a significant part of their young lives it is not the majority as they are in school for only about 180 days out of the year. And yet, the Georgia senate passed a bill mandating that schools take the BMI of all their students and then aggregate the data to come up with an average for their school. Those with a BMI that is too high will be deemed “Unhealthy Schools.”
Oddly enough, one of the biggest and best supporters of our schools is a place in town that offers a low priced pizza buffet, often giving away coupons for free meals for the book reading clubs and good behavior or academic performance. Chick-fil-et offers fundraiser nights at their restaurants for individual schools. The PTA uses bake sales to raise money. The Girl Scouts sell cookies!
There are many problems with this whole concept that lawmakers did not take into consideration. All summer long, that blasted ice cream van is going to be rolling through our neighborhood. While kids are going to be outside exercising, they are also going to be eating happy meals and lining up with their parents in the buffet line. Church picnics and family reunions will be featuring fried chicken, potato salad and cakes and pies of every sort. And the school can not do a thing about church and family traditions. Here in the south, fried chicken and barbecued pork are religions! And going through hot Georgia summers without ice cream…whose idea was this, anyway?
It’s true that there are some seriously overweight kids around here, but most of the time all you have to is look at the parents to see where that is coming from. Schools can not, nor should they, turn out people who all look the same. We can and do educate our children about healthy lifestyles but if the parents aren’t going to do it, how far are the kids going to go with it?
Schools are tasked with far too much as it is. If the government is serious about this, they need to tax fattening foods in order to pay for educating ALL people about healthy lifestyles. Food choices are mostly about culture, and activity levels reflect the family lifestyle. I’m not serious about the tax because it would impact poor families the most, which is what this bill also does. It will impact the poorest schools the most, just like every other unfunded mandate that comes from Washington or Atlanta.
dick
Georgia’s BMI law March 7, 2008
Posted by Daniel Dage in Ed Policy Discussion, political activism.comments closed
“ONE HAT TOO MANY”
By J. Anthony Wilkins, Retired PAGE* Member
(*Professional Association of Georgia Educators)
The bill mandating that schools in Georgia measure the BMI of each student next year passed the Georgia Senate this week. Now, it goes for consideration by the House of Representatives. Every citizen needs to read this piece of legislation carefully. This action makes one wonder what next will come about in our fair state potentially impacting the effectiveness of our schools.
I guess schools next will be mandated to perform the actual dental work, chiropractic treatment, immunizations, and only the Good Lord knows what else, right there at the school house. They have already been assigned head lice, drugs, gangs, teen pregnancy, multi-lingual education, and several other social problems to solve. Are there any issues left for the home to resolve? And, “they” wonder why test scores are sometimes lower than desired and expected! Maybe, the focus is spread too thin!
Why are school personnel frustrated to the highest level possible these days? Why is the rate of first year teachers remaining in the profession for more than three years so low? Why are so many teachers leaving the profession after they get those 30 years in? Schools can’t do everything for everybody! We’ve taken “in loco parentis” to the point of being totally ridiculous! It was never meant for school personnel to completely replace parents, as some appear to suggest nowadays.
I do agree that obesity has become a huge (no pun intended) problem for us, but who should be the ones to deal with it each day for the betterment of the children they brought into the world? What has happened to personal responsibility for one’s actions? Perhaps, schools should take children at birth and keep them under tight supervision and jurisdiction until they reach the age of 21. That totally absurd proposal might be the only way to offset one of the biggest problems schools have in many cases—trying to undo in six hours what has been done the other eighteen.
The school has become a “Mr. Fix It” for all social shortcomings! For all practical purposes, academics have long ago been put on the back burner. Schools have been used by the government as a social change agent and for social remediation for so long that one has to struggle to recall when the focus was where it should be—on academics for those students who are willing to get the job done, to demonstrate a good work ethic, not be a behavioral problem, and to appreciate supportive and involved parents! That’s the formula which produces responsible, productive, and competent citizens! And, isn’t that the primary purpose of public education?
One day when the role of public education has been completely undermined by the lack of funding, unrealistic and misguided expectations, and outright destructive legislation, we may look back and wonder why we threw the baby out with the bath water. And, without the availability of the public schools to be the “whipping boy” any longer, whatever will be used as the new political football by ambitious politicians in the future?
My reaction is that if you’re going to mandate weighing children, why not the adults, too? I think the average weight of the faculty might be just as important. In fact, given the cost of insurance, it is more relevant to the cost of education overall. Now that I think about it, the average BMI should be taken twice a year at every government facility and institution. Once the average BMI gets into the obese range, there should be some sort of consequences. In the case of congress, they should be prohibited from passing new legislation as well as from collecting paychecks until they slim down.
As if Georgia schools weren’t ridiculous enough.
dick
The Abnormous Progression of NCLB March 4, 2008
Posted by Daniel Dage in Alternate Assessment, Curriculum, Ed Policy Discussion, NCLB.comments closed
If you want to witness the height of absurdity, you have to look no further. I invite any of the NCLB apologists to defend this, if they can. They won’t because they can’t. It is just the natural progression of drunkenness from a drunk/high law.
I’ve discussed on numerous occasions how absurd it is that students with an IQ of less than 25 have to show progression in the standard curriculum. The Georgia Alternate Assessment (GAA) is supposed to show some sort of progression in the regular education curriculum thus meeting the mandates of NCLB. Up until now, those students undergoing the GAA received a special education diploma which is essentially a certificate of completion and little else. It’s only fair, since these students are not taking the regular education classes, could not ever pass the end of course tests or the graduation tests. They can not do the work or even a reasonable facsimile thereof. The GAA is NOT even close to the regular curriculum. My students will never write a research paper. They are pretty high functioning if they write their name! I have students who I work with on recognizing their own name and still can’t do it after 4 years! So giving them a standard diploma would seem to be some sort of sick joke and totally out of the realm of reality.
Now I have been told that this is about to change.
According to the latest information handed down from our county office, those students who pass the GAA will be getting a standard diploma.
From the merely absurd to the outrageously ridiculous. It’s the most abnormous* phase of NCLB but at the same time it is just a logical progression as school districts are forced to game the system. For those still absorbing this, let me paint a picture…
Jim and Larry are two students who are severely and profoundly intellectually disabled respectively. They are currently going through the GAA which means doing several tasks that show they have access to grade level standards. Jim can not speak but he can at least use the bathroom independently. Larry functions at the level of an 11 month old. There are many ways to fail the GAA but none of those ways have anything to do with student achievement. Tameka is actually a pretty bright girl, but she is on her 4th or 5th try passing the Georgia High School Graduation Test (GHSGT). She took algebra, geometry American literature , physical science, biology and world history among other requirements in order to get sufficient credits in order to graduate from teachers specializing in those content areas. She has no diploma of any sort and she will not get one until she passes that test. Jim and Larry will pass their GGAs. Jim and Larry will get standard diplomas but as of this writing, Tameka will not.
Now let’s talk a second about accountability, which proponents of NCLB like to glom all over. Tameka is one of a class of 400 or so. Jim and Larry are part of the class but the GAA group consists of less than 30. When a student fails the GHSGT, it counts against the school for making AYP. However, as an individual, there is no one pressuring her teachers to get her to pass this test. There is no directive issued: TAMEKA MUST PASS THIS TEST OR ELSE! That is not the case with Jim and Larry. Remember, the GAA is not really based on student achievement. It is based on teacher achievement. I have a figurative gun pointed at my head to get them to pass that assessment. Last year I got a nasty letter in my file even though my students passed it, so passing is not even the sole criteria in this thing. But none of Tameka’s teachers got a letter in their file stating that they did not do enough to get Tameka to pass the GHSGT. As long as enough other students pass the test for the school to make AYP, Tameka’s teachers can move on with what they are doing. My kids will get a standard diploma, not because they have learned physical science, but because I was clever enough to assemble a portfolio that shows they had access to the curriculum. Tameka will not get a standard diploma because she has failed the test. It could be because she did not study or work hard enough while doing the coursework, and this is the assumption as long as other students do pass. How, exactly, does this show accountability when teachers of students with IQ’s below 25 are held to a more rigorous standard than those who teach kids with a normal IQ? Or to put it another way, how is accountability demonstrated when the students who have little or no accountability are awarded a diploma when students who are given greater responsibility are denied it on the basis of a single test?
The devastating truth is that a student like Tameka who takes all the classes and does all the work and has actual potential of holding a competitive job may be locked out, while my students will be given the standard diploma even though they will never hold a competitive job and will be recipients of welfare for the rest of their lives. Any system that awards the standard diploma on anything other than student achievement is a farce. Any system that esteems accountability on the basis of anything other than student achievement is worthy of nothing but contempt.
NCLB is worthy of nothing but contempt because Tameka is being left behind while Larry and Jim will be getting credentials that they do not know or care about. Tameka cares deeply about getting her diploma. Larry could care less as long as someone is there to feed him and wipe his bottom. For him, these are major priorities. Tameka passed all of her classes and did all the work and could get a higher paying job, enabling her to produce more in order to pay taxes that could help support people like Jim and Larry. But she will have to live with the minimum wage while Jim and Larry will have less and less services available to help them because of resources that are increasingly scarce. In fact, Tameka herself may join them on the welfare role.
Accountability indeed.
*abnormous – A portmanteau of absurd and enormous
