By Steve Levy
Kudos to Newsday for a splendid editorial attacking the efforts of various state lawmakers and bureaucrats to dramatically lower standards and expectations for Long Island students. https://www.newsday.com/opinion/editorials/ny-board-of-regents-schools-education-test-results-graduation-requirements-diploma-ijy7ye2r
The far left, in its quest to inject diversity, equity, and inclusion into every aspect of our lives, is upset that student test scores have fallen. But, rather than making efforts to increase standards and push students to improve their scores, they simply lowered the passing rate or outright eliminated tests that measure knowledge and aptitude.
They think this is helping the self-esteem of the failing students, but all this is doing is dooming them to failure in a very competitive world.
The United States’ educational system was once the envy of the world. Now, we are sadly in the middle of the pack amongst advanced countries, despite spending far more per pupil than any other nation.
Also complicit in these low standards are the teachers unions who don’t want to be held accountable when students continue to score lower on these testing measures. Rather than improving curriculum and enhancing accountability, they say, “Let’s do away with the test altogether.” What hogwash!
We can do better. Hopefully, lawmakers will read this Newday editorial carefully and respond accordingly.