Here’s a novel idea: Require elementary school students to prove they have learned something in one grade before promoting them to the next. That may not sound like a radical notion, in fact it sounds like plain old common sense. But for years the Chicago Public Schools have passed children from one grade to the next automatically as a matter of policy.
The Chicago School Reform Board of Trustees last week wisely struck down that policy, under which a child could be demoted or held back only one time from 1st through 8th grade, regardless of academic performance.
From now on, students can be required to repeat a grade whenever their teacher and principal think they aren’t ready to move on. This admirable new policy is designed less to hold students back than to make sure they have the skills to move forward.
Starting next fall, 3rd-graders who score more than a year below grade level in reading and math on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills and 6th-graders who score more than 1 1/2 years below grade level will be required to attend summer school.
And beginning this year, 8th graders who score more than two years behind grade level in those subjects must attend summer school before going on to high school.
It’s not enough, but it’s a start. Realistically, it’s probably as much as the system can handle for the first year or two. The sad legacy of the so-called social-promotion policy is that huge numbers of Chicago’s school children are woefully behind where they should be academically.
Each year the new policy is in place should be an improvement over the last, as 3rd- and 6th-graders who have attended summer school to improve their skills move up through the system.
But the school board should make no mistake about what the ultimate goal must be: A system in which no children are passed onto a higher grade (or graduated) until they have mastered the skills required for the grade they are in.
The state Board of Education is developing a set of academic standards for all Illinois schools. It’s a worthy project, but the standards will be meaningless if students are not rigorously required to meet them.
Last week, as President Clinton met with the nation’s governors to discuss the need for education standards, business leaders renewed their complaint that schools are doing a poor job of preparing students for the world of work–or for anything else.
Schools do their students no favors by passing them from grade to grade without teaching them what they will need to know in order to function in a complex society. Those who guide the Chicago Public Schools have learned this lesson. It’s too bad that their predecessors didn’t.
