ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, April 25, 1997 TAG: 9704250008
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-13 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RICK CALHOUN
I HAVE great concern about the new Standards of Accreditation for the Commonwealth of Virginia.
While I favor increasing student expectations and higher student achievement, I believe that not all students seeking an Advanced Studies Diploma need to have the State Department of Education and the State Board of Education mandating career tracking by requiring students to take all academic courses and providing little, if any, option for students to choose elective classes.
Many students opt for the Advanced Studies Diploma but would also like to take, and would benefit from, other elective courses along with the academic courses. These courses are for personal interests in art, business, marketing, technology, keyboarding and work and family studies, to name a few.
The Standard Diploma recommendations are good and will increase proficiency while allowing students to continue to pursue elective choices. However, by increasing student credits for graduation in both the Standard and Advanced Studies Diploma, you are, in effect, increasing localities' costs.
How can this be? Students will be eliminating study halls and taking more rigorous courses in the classroom. This will increase student proficiency. But more classes taken will require either more teachers, or higher pupil-teacher ratios in classrooms. I wonder how local boards of supervisors and school boards will view these increased costs without additional funds being provided by the state Department of Education.
I have other questions concerning our new proposed Standards of Accreditation:
How will special-needs students, those already at somewhat of a disadvantage, perform with these new, more rigorous requirements? I predict we will see these students struggling more, falling further behind and dropping out of school at a higher rate than we experience today. This will be true unless we provide additional assistance for student remediation.
How will school divisions currently operating on a six-period day be affected by the increase in credits required to graduate with the new Advanced Studies Diploma? I suggest that these localities will be forced either to move to block scheduling or a seven-period day, or students will need to attend summer school each year to meet the new graduation requirements. Any of these options will have a significant impact on local budgets.
Has anyone seen or read any of the latest research concerning where the jobs are going to be in the future? Does our state board understand that by the year 2000, approximately 20 percent of all of the jobs in the United States will require a four-year college degree? The majority of jobs in our economy will require training beyond high school in math and communications as students increase their technical skill areas.
I have not failed to hear what the business community is telling us, and understand that students must have higher academic standards. However, these standards must not be achieved by sacrificing elective options. These programs enhance and complement student academics in order that our students can better function as productive workers, citizens, taxpayers and parents.
I urge the Virginia State Board not to rush into making quick decisions without thoroughly researching the impact that these new Accreditation Standards will have on the future of our students and the local governments in the Commonwealth of Virginia.
RICK CALHOUN is supervisor of marketing and adult education for Roanoke County schools' Department of Vocational and Adult Education.
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