The layers of the rotten onion are slowly being peeled away from the longtime failures of the Baltimore City school system. While this problem has been occurring for decades, it is finally getting it's due exposure largely due local TV station WBFF's "Project Baltimore" By the way, have you ever noticed how most city "leaders" largely ignore anything asked or initiated by WBFF? Hmm....
One of the most eye-opening examples came last March when it was revealed that a student at Augusta Fells Institute only passed three classes in four years. Although this student failed various classes, he was still allowed to graduate to the next level of each class. But perhaps the the most outrageous revelation of all was, even with his dismal .13 GPA, the kid was still in the top 50% of his class! So, more than half of the other students were worse off than him! *
And it was recently discovered that 75% of all students at Baltimore's Patterson High School are reading at an elementary school level. Some are at a kindergarten level. Of the 628 students tested, only 12 were reading at their grade level. No, that's not a typo.**
Of course, defenders of the school system will try to act surprised and pretend that this is something new. COVID restrictions and virtual learning are convenient excuses. But anyone who really believes that this problem has only been around for two years has their head buried in the sand.
Since the overwhelming majority of Baltimore's students happen to be African-American, you have to wonder where the NAACP or BLM is on this issue. How many young black lives are being ruined by the current school situation? Why no outrage? Do these kids' lives matter?
The school system definitely deserves their share of the blame. When the dust settles, I'm sure that it will boil down to money. It almost always does. When big money is involved, you will inevitably find corruption.
But the parents of these students need to own some of this too. If parents were fully in tune with their kids, it's hard for me to believe that they wouldn't recognize these learning deficiencies. And if they are recognizing them, they really don't seem to care. If you're the parent of 12th grader who can't recognize that your kid can't read, you're part of the problem.
Gather up folks, it's story time.....
Once upon a time there was a bright young lady who aspired to become a school teacher. She went to college and got her degree in Education. She was on her way to make a difference in the world. Well, she landed her first teaching job, which just so happened to be at Baltimore City elementary school.
Upon arrival, the first thing she noticed was that the kids were a bit unruly. As the initial days rolled on, traditional classroom activities were routinely disrupted by random outbursts and physicals altercations. Things escalated to the point where even the young teacher became the victim of these assaults. The worst case being where she was almost choked unconscious by one of the more ambitious students.
On any given day, there were a fair amount of empty desks due to students being out on suspension. But even the students who were present didn't seem to have a big interest in learning about prepositional phrases or compound fractions. The teacher did the best she could, but she was set up for failure by the whole system. Let me tell you why....
When it came time for report cards, she appropriately failed the majority of her students. However, when school administrators heard of this, they immediately told her that this was unacceptable. Even though the kids did not pass the required tests to justify a decent report card, the teacher was told to pass the kids anyway. Hmm, sounds a lot like the problem at Augusta Fells and Patterson, huh?
When it came time for Parent-Teacher Conference Night, the young teacher looked forward to discussing the academic issues with the kiddie's parents. Well, to her surprise and disappointment, no parents showed up!
It was really too much to take for the young teacher. It was heartbreaking for her to see how these young lives were being ignored. She had no support from the school system nor the parents. She was up against a wall, They didn't prepare her for this in college. She eventually got frustrated and put her teaching career on hold. She would eventually land in a better place. But sadly, nothing has changed for the Baltimore City students she left behind....
And even before this happened, I met another young lady who experienced a similar situation. She happened to be working as a receptionist at the time I met her. She revealed to me that she had a teaching degree. I instinctively asked why she was answering phones instead of teaching. She told me that she had been physically assaulted by her students (more than once, by the way) and she made the decision to leave the profession. Think about that for a minute... teachers are leaving the profession because of safety issues.
These are actual stories that were directly told to me by two former teachers....
Baltimore City has many problems and the downward spiral continues. There's little doubt that the lack of education is largely responsible for many of these issues. Without an education, your odds of success are severely limited. And without parent involvement, you really have no odds. It's a sad situation. And until people at high levels are held accountable, expect it to continue...
kw
