I remember how it was -- JR
Group to protest proposal to eliminate test for Boston exam schools
This is a proposal to destroy the schools concerned. It's only selective admissions that make them special
A group of parents and alumni plan to rally on the front steps of Boston Latin School on Sunday to protest a proposal to eliminate in the 2021-2022 school year the test students have to pass to get into the city’s three prestigious public exam schools.
“This was a very big surprise when it was announced on Oct. 8, and now the school committee could decide on it this Wednesday,” said Bruce McKinnon, member of BLS’s class of 1974. “These schools are considered some of the finest in the nation.”
A working group will hold an information session from 5 to 6:30 p.m. Monday about the group’s recommendation to the school committee on the criteria and process for admission to Boston Latin School, Boston Latin Academy and the John D. O’Bryant School of Mathematics and Science.
Currently, about 2,000 to 3,000 students take an exam for a total of 1,000 seats each year at the three schools, and admission is based 50% on the test results and 50% on students’ grade point average.
A district spokesman did not return a phone call or an email about the proposal to change that for the next school year.
But a report by three of the working group’s nine members this week says that its goals are to “ensure that students will be enrolled through a clear and fair process for admission in the 21-22 school year that takes into account the circumstances of the COVID-19 global pandemic that disproportionately affected families in the city of Boston” and to “work towards an admissions process that will support student enrollment at each of the exam schools such that it better reflects the socioeconomic, racial and geographic diversity of all students (K-12) in the city of Boston.”
San Francisco looks to rename 44 schools, expunging the likes of Washington, Lincoln and even FEINSTEIN for their impurities
Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt are among the historical figures whose names are no longer considered honorable enough to adorn public schools in San Francisco.
The city's school board is looking to rename as many as 44 of the 125 public schools in its district after a panel of community members appointed to study the issue found their namesakes to be problematic by today's standards of woke conduct, the local ABC television affiliate reported. The committee's review criteria targeted colonizers, slave owners, perpetrators of genocide, racists, human-rights violators, environmental abusers and those who oppressed or abused women, children, gay or transgender people.
Three of the four men whose faces were sculpted on Mt. Rushmore failed to measure up, including the president who pushed through the constitutional amendment abolishing slavery in the US. The committee found all three to have connections to slavery, genocide or oppression, so Abraham Lincoln High School, George Washington High School and Jefferson Elementary may be renamed.
Roosevelt Middle School also was put on the renaming block after Franklin Roosevelt, the only four-term US president, was deemed problematic. Even US Senator Dianne Feinstein was found to have insufficient moral purity, meaning Feinstein Elementary may get a new name. The staunch Democrat was faulted for reportedly replacing a vandalized Confederate flag back in 1986, when she was San Francisco's mayor.
One committee member also pushed – apparently unsuccessfully – for the canceling of Thomas Edison Elementary because the inventor electrocuted stray dogs and cats in demonstrations of his findings.
The school board has asked principals of the affected schools and parents of students to submit suggestions for new names by December 18. The board plans to vote on any name changes in January or February. It may decide to keep the current names of at least some of the 44 schools targeted for renaming by the committee.
The renaming push comes amid a left-wing war on history that has toppled statues ranging from Confederate generals to founding fathers, and from President Theodore Roosevelt to an iconic elk that had stood in downtown Portland for 120 years. San Francisco's school board voted last year to cover up 1930s murals at George Washington High School because they depicted slaves and a dead Native American man.
Local media reports noted opposition to changing school names, including a statement by San Francisco Mayor London Breed that devoting resources to the initiative is “offensive” given that the buildings remain closed to in-person classes amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
Twitter commenters were more focused on the mental state of San Francisco's decision-makers, calling the move “more sickness,” “coocoo” and “going too far.” Others suggested new names that might be more appreciated in San Francisco, including Lenin, Stalin, Marx, Mao, Pelosi and George Floyd.
https://www.rt.com/usa/503777-san-francisco-school-renamings/
San Francisco mayor hits school district for renaming schools, rather than reopeningSan Francisco Mayor London Breed on Friday hit out at the city’s school district for beginning a process of renaming schools under its control, rather than reopening them.
“Conversations around school names can be had once the critical work of educating our young people in person is underway,” Breed said in a statement. “Once that is happening, then we can talk about everything else. Until those doors are open, the School Board and the District should be focused on getting out kids back in the classroom.”
Breed was reacting to a move by the San Francisco School Names Advisory Committee, which has reportedly researched school names and identified certain ones for renaming.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, some of the schools listed under the proposed name changes included Abraham Lincoln High School, George Washington High School, Roosevelt Middle School and Jefferson Elementary.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/san-francisco-mayor-schools-renaming-reopening
Australia: New NSW schools policy will make it harder for difficult children to be suspendedParents, teachers and principals have joined forces to fight a proposal that would reduce the length of school suspensions, arguing it would weaken schools’ ability to deal with violent students and blur standards of acceptable behaviour.
Frank Potter, an executive director at the NSW Department of Education, was questioned about the department's draft suspension policy at the Disability Royal Commission's public hearing into inclusive education, which began on Monday.
He said an increased number of students with various degrees of disability were attending the state's schools and more funding was being allocated to them. "It's appropriate that decisions, [and] policies that might have been in place before, are reviewed to the context of the day," he said.
The commission heard the case of five-year-old Sam, who had been suspended seven times in his first 13 months of school. "I can't comment on how appropriate that would be within that context," Mr Potter said. He said Sam would not have been suspended under the new draft policy.
"There is discretion [in the draft policy] and there are opportunities for schools to put in place other strategies rather than resorting to suspension," he said.
Under the present policy, schools must suspend students who are physically violent, regardless of the student's intent.
Junior counsel assisting the commission Elizabeth Bennett asked whether accidental conduct that resulted in serious physical harm would mean a student must be suspended.
"If there was serious harm or impact, yes, I think that's what it would be. That would be my view rightly or wrongly," Mr Potter said.
"Do you see any potential for the policy to operate in a way that disproportionately impacts on students with a disability when understood that way?" Ms Bennett asked. Mr Potter replied "yes".
"Do you think it's right that a policy of the NSW department disproportionately affects children with a disability?" Ms Bennett then asked.
"No policy should have an unintended consequence and therefore it needs to be reviewed," Mr Potter said.
The proposed new strategy would cut the maximum school suspension from 20 to 10 days, and students from kindergarten to year 2 could only be sent home for serious physical violence, and for no longer than five days.
Disability advocates support plans that make it harder for schools to order young children home for bad behaviour or repeated disobedience, but principals have called the rules impractical.
At present, principals must make reasonable adjustments for a student before they are suspended.
Under questioning, Mr Potter said there was no documentation outlining what reasonable adjustments entailed. "My expectation [is] that professional people in schools would clearly understand what was required in order to be in place to support students with disabilities," he said.
"The principal has ultimate responsibility to make a decision."
Ms Bennett asked whether one school principal could take a particularly broad approach of what constitutes a reasonable adjustment, while another might take a narrow approach. "Wouldn't a student with a disability face a radically different experience at those two schools?" she asked.
"That would be possible," Mr Potter said. "I think we do our best with challenges that are before us and the ways in which schools respond to those challenges may well be different, depending on experience and understanding."
Consultation on the draft policy closed on Sunday. The NSW Teachers Federation, the P&C Federation, and primary and secondary principals groups have said schools needed more specialist staff and early intervention to stop unaddressed student needs turning into poor behaviour.
Mr Potter said recommendations from the Ombudsman and royal commission would "also help inform taking that strategy forward, in terms of its development".
***********************************
My other blogs: Main ones below
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com.au/ (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
*******************************
No comments:
Post a Comment