Reply to WSJ - To Increase Equity, School Districts Eliminate Honors Classes

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I don't know that it was isolated or secret. At Kennedy, the Honors for All movement was spearheaded by Michael Williams, the social studies lead, and he was widely applauded and recognized for it. He was even named MCPS Teacher of the year for it.

I'm not sure if the current iteration of Honors for All matches Williams' intent, but it was definitely an approach that was endorsed by the previous superintendent.

This article details from 2019 some of the issues and the context: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/honors-classes-for-all-leave-some-parents-asking-is-it-really-honors/2019/08/03/f3adef36-a1a6-11e9-b8c8-75dae2607e60_story.html

[QUOTE]Michael V. Williams, a social studies teacher and department head at John F. Kennedy High School, [b]pushed to eliminate regular classes in U.S. history, U.S. government and modern world history at his school, enrolling more students in honors[/b].

Before, the regular and honors courses had been virtually the same in many ways, he said.

“It was so unjust to me that a kid could take the same exact class with the same curriculum and same [county-created] tests and not receive the same credit,” he said.

Williams said too many black and Hispanic students were steered to regular courses in county schools over the years while white and Asian students were assigned to honors versions. The disparity stood out while he taught at Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda, where he co-founded the Minority Scholars Program, partly to foster greater access to more rigorous courses.

“We were essentially tracking students, and it was affecting black and brown students disproportionately,” he said. “We were seeing segregation, for lack of a better word.”[/QUOTE][/quote]

All the educators who pretend to care about this should circle back to elementary school. Go to Kindergarten, first grade, second grade, third grade classrooms. Make sure Black children are reading, go to their homes, make sure they are reading piles of library books, and moms and dads are reading to them.  Make sure their diets are healthy, and they are exercising. Make sure they go to museums and cultural outings, and learn about the world out of their community.

One reason high schoolers do so well in academic classes is because of the education they receive in their early years. Both in the classroom, and outside of it. UMC families typically are read too often, exposed to larger vocabulary, taken to tutors if needed, taken to museums, travel and so on.  For poor children, whose families cannot do these things, the classroom then is even more critical. And too many kids get a crappy early education. How about starting there. [/quote]

Another reason they do well has to do with family life and parental expectations. This isn't something the county can legislate.[/quote]

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