I'm not necessarily opposed to tracking or to gifted and talented programs. I graduated 35th in a class of some of the brightest high school kids you could ever hope to meet (Saint Paul Central Class of 92 had 10 National Merit Semifinalists) and went on to a private college (Saint Olaf) where some private school kids and suburban/rural public schools served up peers that struggled with things that we had mastered by 10th grade. The strange part for me is that most of my public school choices were to attend the neighborhood schools that I would have attended minus a magnet school program (JJ Hill, Longfellow, Ramsey, Central). What was divergent was the number of friends I had from other parts of the city. Students that would have attended high schools like Highland, Como, Harding and Johnson. Why did they choose Central when their peers did not ? The answer was a public school "track" that helped educate parents about options. To be fair, these were the type of parents that might have educated themselves anyway, but it was a network of information that brought more information to some parents than to others. I'm not trying to say that it is easy to figure out how to get this information out to all parents, I'm just saying that I think that some families have more information than others. If we want to imply that we have a consumer driven model, we need to make sure that the consumers have the information to exercise choice. Matt Flory Mac Groveland
Bob Treumann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: I'm not sure if the definition of "Tracking" is important here, and since I am not an educator, I don't have the official word. However, my experience as a St Paul parent is that when people say they are against "Tracking", what they mean is that they don't want to give smart high-acheiving kids an appropriately challenging curriculum, because they know that if they do that, the results will not be racially balanced. So, to preserve the illusion that all kids are getting a challenging and thought provoking education, we won't allow kids to be separated by ability and taught at an appropriate level. Thus, the smart kids are bored in class, and think school is too easy. [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: > Matt describes tracking and asks if this is choice. > y > Tracking is a system that encourages some students to take rigourous, > college > prep courses, and encourages others to take other, much less challenging > courses. It is exactly the opposite of what we are working for - we are > trying to > help St. Paul high schools develop small more individualized schools in > which > ALL students are challenged, all students are prepared for some form of > post-secondary education when they graduate, and ALL students have thought > hard - > and investigated various careers. > > The is high expectations for all - not high expectations for some, and > lower > for others. > > Joe > _____________________________________________ > To Join: St. Paul Issues Forum Rules Discussion > Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > _____________________________________________ > NEW ADDRESS FOR LIST: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > To subscribe, modify subscription, or get your password - visit: > http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/listinfo/stpaul > > Archive Address: > http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/private/stpaul/ > -- Bob Treumann, Saint Paul Please Note: Replies to this email address all go to the trash except where the subject line contains a recognized mailing list identifier, such as [TCMETRO],[StPaul], MP-N ... --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. _____________________________________________ To Join: St. Paul Issues Forum Rules Discussion Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] _____________________________________________ NEW ADDRESS FOR LIST: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, modify subscription, or get your password - visit: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/listinfo/stpaul Archive Address: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/private/stpaul/
