Principal Tells Teachers To Dumb-Down Standards

[leobold1]

wcbstv.com - Principal Tells Teachers To Dumb-Down Standards

HARLEM (CBS) ― Have teachers at an East Harlem school been ordered to lower their standards because many students there are poor?

That's the impression some got from their principal's memo.

And now City Hall has stepped in.

The weather was gloomy Thursday outside Central Park East High School, but the talk was about a controversial memo from the school's principal.

"I don't think he thinks we're dumb," 12th grader Crystal Scarlett said. "He just thinks we can do much better than we're doing."

But not everyone agreed.

Last month, Principal Bennett Lieberman sent off a stern memo to teachers.

"If you are not passing more than 65 percent of your students in a class, then you are not designing your expectations to meet their abilities, and you are setting your students up for failure, which, in turn, limits your success as a professional."

Was he ordering teachers to dumb down their classes?

The memo continued:

"Most of our students come from the lowest third percentile in academic achievement, have difficult home lives, and struggle with life in general. They DO NOT have a similar upbringing nor a similar school experience to our experiences growing up."

Some students took offense.

"That's not the way to pass," 12th grader Richard Palacios said. "That's not the way to get your education, so you're basically cheating yourself."

CBS 2 HD made several requests to speak with the principal and he refused. But he is standing by his comments.

Lieberman told a newspaper Thursday he "confidently stands by" his words.

But late Thursday, the Department of Education weighed in. It sent him a letter demanding he clarify his views and state that he is not ordering his teachers to lower their standards.

No word back yet from the principal.

Teachers at the school stand to receive $3,000 bonuses if their school improves.

[redtanker]

sounds to me like he told them to lower their standards

[Snowden]

Yes, that's what comes across in this memo -- lower the standards so these stupid kids can get out of here! He really should be fired over this. He is insulting those kids, and some of them could be geniuses. They still would stand little chance of achievement if they pass Grade 12 with Grade 5 educations.

[Woodmonkey]

It sounds to me like he told them to lower standards (that's another education-ese word for expectations). The principal is held accountable for how the students in the school do and the teachers are accountable to him. Sometimes, when half a class fails a subject, it's entirely the students fault and there's nothing the teacher can do and you have to accept that. If kids don't want to learn, they won't. But....you don't lower standards for them.

[BrianK]

Could it be that the principal is setting the students up for how to fit into a warm & fuzzy feel good liberal society?

Is he expecting Hillary to suceed in her bid to be elected and is ahead of the curve himself in generating a portion of society that will become totally dependent on gov. to solve all lifes problems?

I wonder if there is more of this taking place than is known. Sometimes all it takes is for one story like this to break the ice and a flood of other stories begins to unfold.

[Woodmonkey]

No Student Left Behind established some standards and the teachers' unions were against it. The same happened when Oregon raised the standards with the CIM (Certificate of Initial Mastery). The teachers union fought it tooth and nail. What I liked about the CIM was that the greatest emphasis was on the primary grades with testing in the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 8th and 10th grades. It was an unspoken admission that high schools can do little with students who show up as Freshman not able to read, do math etc. but they frequently are blamed.