I remember how it was -- JR
Study finds online schooling is severely damaging students' academic achievement
A new study conducted by Virginia's largest school system found that distance learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic is severely damaging academic achievement.
In comparison to the last academic year, the percentage of middle school and high school students enrolled in Fairfax County Public Schools receiving marks of "F" in two or more classes during the first quarter of this academic year rose from 6% to 11%, the district's Office of Research and Strategic Improvement found. The numbers represent a year-over-year increase of 83%.
Younger students were much more seriously affected than older ones, as middle-schoolers exhibited a 300% increase in marks of "F," while high schoolers exhibited a 50% increase.
The study also found that some of the most vulnerable students — those with disabilities and English-language learners — were the ones who have been struggling the most.
The number of students with disabilities who scored marks of "F" in two or more classes shot up by 111% to account for nearly one-fifth of those students, while the number of English-language learners who scored marks of "F" increased by 106% to account for 35% of those students.
While students in certain demographics exhibited more pronounced increases than others, the study found that "the pattern was pervasive across all student groups, grade levels, and content areas examined in this report."
What else?
In a summary of the findings, district researchers acknowledged that "there is reason for concern," especially considering that students who were previously not performing well were the ones who were having the hardest time.
"Results indicate a widening gap between students who were previously performing satisfactorily and those performing unsatisfactorily," the report noted. "In other words, students who performed well previously primarily performed slightly better than expected during Q1 of this year. In contrast, students who were previously not performing well, performed considerably less well. A greater proportion of low-performing students received failing grades during Q1 than would have been expected based on patterns of marks in prior years."
In a statement to the Washington Post, the school system's superintendent, Scott Brabrand, said they are working quickly to identify and aid the students who are struggling the most.
"We are working on identifying these students by name and by need and are working on specific interventions to support them right now and as we phase back in person," he said.
Despite the obvious damage being inflicted on students' academic achievement, the school system has halted plans to return to in-person classes until at least Nov. 30 due to a surge in coronavirus cases across the country.
Brabrand, however, vowed during a recent town hall that he has every intention of returning to in-person activities as soon as possible.
"We are committed to returning our kids to in-person. There will be some setbacks. There will be some pauses. I cannot promise you that it will be linear," he said.
https://www.theblaze.com/news/virginia-study-online-school-damaging-grades
Supreme Court says it is OK to have males in female bathroomsThe Supreme Court on Monday turned away a challenge brought by Oregon parents to a school district's policy allowing transgender students to use bathroom facilities that match their gender identity.
The dispute was brought by a group of parents who argued the policy enacted by Dallas School District No. 2 in Dallas, Oregon, and left in place by lower courts violated other students' privacy rights. The policy was created after a transgender boy sought to use the boy's bathroom and locker room at his high school until he graduated. The school district allowed the student to do so over the objections of some parents.
In November 2017, the parents, who formed the group Parents for Privacy, sued the school district over its decision, alleging violations of the 14th and First Amendments, as well as Title IX. But the district court dismissed the lawsuit, and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court's decision, upholding the policy.
The parents appealed the 9th Circuit's decision to the Supreme Court, arguing the justices have "the opportunity to untie a Gordian knot of conflicting constitutional and statutory rights."
"The District's directive interferes with parents' rights to direct the upbringing of their children, schoolchildren's rights to bodily privacy, parents' and children's rights to free exercise of religion, and children's rights to be free from hostile educational environments under Title IX," the parents argued in a filing with the Supreme Court, adding that "stakes in this case are significant" for public school parents and their children.
But lawyers for the Dallas School District argued the claims raised by the parents were "misconceived" and flawed. They also argued the case was moot, since the student whose request sparked the lawsuit has since graduated.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/supreme-court-oregon-transgender-bathroom-case-declined/
Falls Church, Virginia School Board Cancels Thomas JeffersonIn a unanimous vote Tuesday, the Falls Church, Virginia School Board voted to rename Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, as well as George Mason High School, replacing the names of these Founding Fathers with those of people who are more woke and acceptable to the vanguard of today’s Cultural Revolution.
School Board Chair Greg Anderson, tongue no doubt planted firmly in cheek, intoned the usual pieties: “The Board took seriously the viewpoints and concerns raised by many students, parents, staff, and community members.” Except it didn’t, since according to WTOP, “a survey of the Falls Church community taken in October…revealed that 56% of the community overall asked that the names stay on the schools, including 61% of the parents of Thomas Jefferson Elementary students and 57% of George Mason High parents.” But their viewpoints didn’t count. As is always the case, the only viewpoints that mattered were those of the woke mob.
Not grasping the old adage that it is better to be silent and be thought an idiot than to open one’s mouth and prove it, Anderson rambled on: “We thank everyone who shared their perspectives with us and will be mindful of your comments as we now begin selecting names that reflect the diversity of opinions in our community” – except, that is, the opinions of the majorities who thought Thomas Jefferson and George Mason were fine names and need not be changed. “Our schools must be places where all students, staff, and community members feel safe, supported, and inspired.” Except, that is, those who respect and revere the Founding Fathers.
And so the foes of American history and America itself, for to repudiate the one is to repudiate the other, score another victory. If His Fraudulency Joe Biden succeeds in gaining the presidency by massive voter fraud, it will hardly matter anyway, but America can only have a future as a free society if its people recover a deep appreciation for its heroes and a pride in its achievements. In fact, that’s why the Left embarked upon its statue-destroying frenzy, tearing down statues not just of Confederates but of Lincoln, Grant, and even Frederick Douglass. They want to make you ashamed of American history so that you won’t see in America anything worth defending as the country continues to be assaulted from within and from outside, with useful idiots such as Greg Anderson helping on the destroyers.
Ahistorical myopia and ignorance of history as displayed by Anderson is a significant cause of the current outpouring of hatred for America. The war on Jefferson and Mason, both slaveowners, is just one small part of the Left’s relentless defamation of our country as a bastion of racial hatred and injustice. Leftist rioters and destroyers are enraged at Americans who are memorialized despite being slaveowners. They’re oblivious to the fact that slavery was not universally considered a moral evil at the time these men lived, and that this is relevant because there are very likely to be people in future ages who look at our times and scratch their heads and ask each other How could they not have known that was wrong?
Even more importantly, the Leftists are heedless of the fact that the movement to abolish slavery arose in Britain and America because of Christian principles that they despise, while slavery persisted long into the twentieth century in several Muslim countries because of Islamic principles that Leftists would rather be caught at a Trump rally than criticize. Saudi Arabia, a country based strictly upon Islamic law, only abolished slavery in 1962, and North African states including Mauritania and Niger only did so in the early twenty-first century, because of Islamic laws that the Leftist rioters would no doubt say it was “Islamophobic” to denounce.
In contrast, it was Greg Anderson’s bête noire Thomas Jefferson who wrote the words “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” It was those words that led many Americans, long before the Civil War, to believe that slavery was not only evil in itself, but incompatible with the principles of the American republic. Slavery was ultimately eradicated in the United States by people who believed that Thomas Jefferson had enunciated the principles that made it necessary to wipe it out.
It will be interesting to see who Thomas Jefferson Elementary and George Mason High are named for now. Malcolm X? Angela Davis? Che Guevara? Mao Zedong? Whoever it will be, it is almost certain that the honored figures will be just as imperfect, and maybe even worse violators of human rights than Jefferson or Mason. But the Left is indifferent to the imperfections of its own heroes; its objective is not to find perfect or sinless people to venerate, but to turn Americans against their own heritage. In Falls Church, Virginia, it’s working.
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