THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, March 27, 1995 TAG: 9503270029
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JON GLASS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 153 lines
A yearlong push by the Allen administration to create new academic standards for Virginia's public schools is creating high anxiety among the state's education community and many parents.
Fundamental differences exist over proposed changes that, in some cases, would radically alter what children are taught in four essential subjects - social studies, language arts, math and science.
Today, the state Board of Education, which has the final stamp of approval, begins a statewide series of open hearings on the proposal at 7 p.m. at Maury High School in Norfolk. The board can expect an earful.
Some worry that the state is trying to move too fast on a plan that will have long-lasting effects. Others contend that the effort is more reflective of a narrow political agenda than sound teaching practices. And many fear that in the rush for higher standards, the state may be creating unrealistic expectations that will set up some children for failure.
State schools chief William C. Bosher Jr. praises the revised ``standards of learning'' as tough, measurable and easily understood. Now comes the acid test: How will the SOLs stand up under public scrutiny? ``This is not a train running through that can't be stopped,'' Bosher said. ``I don't want these standards to represent the best politics. I want them to be the best standards.''
``We have a lot of concerns about this,'' said Marcy Burnett, president of Norfolk's Mary Calcott Elementary and the mother of a fourth-grader and a kindergartner. Her most serious concern involves the social studies standards, which have drawn widespread criticism. ``To me,'' she said, ``they represent a step backwards.''
The standards of learning, last revised in the late 1980s, spell out what students should be taught at each grade level.
Bosher contends that the existing standards are weak academically and are essentially useless because they are not used to measure school performance. There's no accountability, he says, for ensuring that students are learning what the state board considers important.
Changing the standards is only the first step to remedy what ails public education in Virginia, Bosher said. He also wants to throw out standardized tests that the state uses to gauge student achievement and create new tests based on the revised SOLs.
In addition, he wants to attach consequences. For example, schools that consistently turned out students unable to pass the SOL tests or that failed to improve could lose accreditation. School systems making strides would be offered incentives, such as more money or freedom to innovate.
Gov. George F. Allen's idea to transform the SOLs into regulations - with the teeth of law - has triggered alarm. In the General Assembly session just past, Democrats rejected a bill that would have done what the governor wants, but the issue will resurface next year.
``It seems to me if you make them regulations, you're tying the hands of the school system and possibly creating a lot of work for lawyers,'' said Robley S. Jones, president of the Virginia Education Association.
Some educators said the new standards could create a financial burden.
``Arlington has revised its K-12 curriculum over the last three years, and I can tell you this would not fit what they're going to be requiring,'' said Sue Rafferty, a high school history and government teacher in Arlington. ``We'd have to toss out literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in textbooks and supplies.''
Donald Wheat, a member of the Allen-appointed Commission on Champion Schools, who said the proposed social studies standards would be ``light years ahead'' of other states', said the only ``valid criticism'' was the problem of finding textbooks to match the new standards. Wheat said he favors easing the standards into place over the next year, giving teachers, school districts and textbook publishers a chance to adjust.
The process of updating the standards began last spring when Bosher selected four school divisions to take the lead: Virginia Beach headed up language arts, Newport News handled social studies, Fairfax took math and Prince William County oversaw science.
A mix of educators, parents and interested residents reworked the old standards and completed drafts late last year.
The drafts were then passed to the Commission on Champion Schools, which Allen appointed last spring to recommend ways to improve education. Members of the commission's standards and testing committee reviewed the drafts, in some instances deleting or rewriting standards they disliked.
Their intervention has led to charges that politics short-wired what was to be an open process involving a large group of people.
``I think the process is not the best work Virginians are capable of,'' said Melanie Biermann. She is president of the Virginia Consortium of Social Studies Specialists and College Educators, and an associate professor of social studies at Virginia Tech. Biermann participated on a team that wrote a draft on social studies. ``It is not a consensus document,'' she said of the commission's version. ``A lot of it (the draft) was thrown out.''
The revisions in language arts and social studies differ substantially from existing guidelines, particularly in elementary grades.
The current social studies standards, for example, are based on a teaching practice called ``expanded horizons,'' in which children beginning school are first taught to appreciate themselves and their schoolmates. After that, the scope widens as they advance in school, moving from families and community to encompass the world.
The revised standards abandon this for what proponents describe as a more knowledge-based approach. Currently, backers said, pupils don't encounter academic concepts in social studies until fourth grade.
``Students, for whatever reason, are not getting the foundation they need,'' said Wheat, who teaches American government and politics at Lord Botetourt High School in Daleville. ``That's a trend we need to turn around.''
Some parents and educators are also concerned that proposed standards fail to expose kids to a multicultural view of the world. Opponents point to a Dec. 15 internal memo, written by Champion Schools member Sylvia Kraemer, that they say illustrates the bias.
Kraemer, who helped revise language arts standards, noted that a suggested reading list in the draft document deals ``with non-Western, non-White, and non-American subjects. This is not acceptable. At least one-half of the suggested titles should deal with the experience of Americans (who are paying for the schools and the teachers' salaries), and whose political system is the principal rationale for public education.''
Kraemer, an Alexandria resident who works for NASA, said the final draft was a collaborative product. She defended her position on the reading list. ``There was an element in the previous standards that always looked at America in a negative way - how we oppressed Indians and how we ruined the environment with technology,'' Kraemer said. ``I think we tried to come back closer to the center on that.'' ILLUSTRATION: SOME EXAMPLES
Language arts:
OLD: The student will gain insight into history and cultures
through the study of literature.
The student understands that literature and the culture and
historical period in which it was written are clearly interrelated
in many respects.
NEW: The student will analyze relationships among American
literature, history and culture.
Describe contributions of European and other cultures to the
development of American literature.
Describe the development of American literature in the 19th
century.
Contrast 20th century American literature with its predecessors.
Explain the use of major themes in American literature: the
wilderness, the city, the republic, the wasteland, the dream and the
pilgrimmage.
Social Studies
Second grade:
OLD: The student will help make classroom rules. The focus will
be on active participation by all students in the rule-making
process. Identifying problems, suggesting solutions and working
together.
NEW: The student will describe and compare the making of some
class rules by direct democracy (e.g., the entire class votes on the
rules), and by representative democracy (e.g., the class selects a
smaller group to make the rules).
KEYWORDS: VIRGINIA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION HEARINGS EDUCATION by CNB