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School Committee chairman: BPS should offer test prep to all students interested in exam schools

School Committee Chairman Michael O'Neill says BPS should give every student who wants to attend free test-prep classes to help them get ready for the ISEE test that is one of the two criteria for getting into the city's three exam schools, as part of the overall move towards dealing with racial disparities at Boston Latin School.

BPS currently provides free test prep for the first 375 students who apply each year. O'Neill said that if BPS can't afford to open the programs to more students, it should look for grant money. Better off parents often enroll their children in private prep classes to prepare for the test.

O'Neill continued he wants officials to look at another possible issue: Whether parochial and private schools in Boston give higher grades to students than BPS students doing the same quality of work. If true, he said, that would give them an unfair advantage because GPAs represent the other criterion for judging who goes to one of the city's three exam schools.

O'Neill emphasized these would only be part of the answer to the issues raised at BLS. He said he has heard that some black students who do get accepted to BLS turn it down because "they don't feel it's an accepting enriching environment for them."

O'Neill and other School Committee members praised Superintendent Tommy Chang for expanding a probe into issues at BLS into a review of what's going on across the entire BPS system.

"The work has just commenced," Chang said. "This case is not closed."

He added that by June 30, he will deliver an "anti-racism statement," co-written with students and parents, that will lay out specific goals so that BPS "actively fights against racism" starting with the next school year.

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Integrate the kids, and offer honors at all schools.

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BCLA offers a ton of AP classes, at least until its budget is slashed.

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Agree to offer extra special resources to a minority of children who will do well in any environment when there are a children who actually need more supports just to make it. You can't do both... Not when there is a limited amount of money.

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aspiring to reach higher through the nonlinear gains afforded by enabling the best and brightest to succeed instead of hobbling them by diluting them in a sea of mediocrity.

Did I say that out loud? Nah. Couldn't've. Not PC to say such things out loud.

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The O'Bryant and BLA are very diverse and have over 70% of students who qualify for free or reduced lunch. It's very impressive students who research says won't do week because of their lack of resources/economic situation do so well at these 2 schools.

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It's a little murky with BLS's total per student spending, as alumni and parent fundraising supplements the budget. But as far as cost to BPS and tax payers, spending is on the low side. Funding streams follow the student and are based upon the student's individual learning profile. SPED students cost more to educate and are rightly allocated a much larger share of spending. Though BLS has some SPED students, the percentage of the whole is on the low side, meaning quite a but less funding than received by other schools.

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Of America's problematic history with public schools.

One of the questions we have yet to figure out in this country and this city is whether we want public schools for all our children, or whether what we want is public schools as a form of educational welfare for poor children.

If we want public schools for all the children, then we must provide a free and appropriate public education for all the children. That will not be the same thing for all children: what is appropriate for some children is impossible for others, or stultifying. A substantial proportion of the kids who qualify for Latin fail and/or transfer out. A higher proportion of those who don't qualify would find it impossible. It would not be possible for it to be appropriate for the children who are successful there without it being inappropriate for some others, because people are different from one another.

If what we want is a tight focus on educational welfare for poor children, and to standardize to the lowest common denominator, then we can go ahead and do away with anything that would appeal to middle class parents or more academically inclined children. End AWC, close the exam schools, forget about differentiation. But forget about outcomes too; even for poor children, they will be worse. Take the challenge and the aspiration out of the system, and you end up with kids just doing time.

Also, as you can see by the endowment kept in trust for BLS, it is not a zero-sum game. If you reduce public school to a welfare program for poor kids, you also reduce its total available funding, both from public and private sources. The funds would go down, as the per-pupil cost went up. Financially, BLS is not a drag on the BPS system at large, but a boost; it's the cheapest school in the district for BPS. It's also our flagship school, whose reputation affects the perception of the system as a whole. You wouldn't get to kill the Latin goose and redistribute its endowment. You'd just increase the cost to educate a reduced and more difficult BPS population, with no additional funding sources and reduced political support.

Fortunately, nobody is going to close Latin. All the spite and race-baiting in the world won't accomplish that. But it would be nice to see people with enough energy to release angry letters and demand heads on platters turn themselves to something productive and improve the rest of the system.

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Let's get rid if unions in public education. But I'm sure you're feeling "the bern"!

What do you think would happen to BPS if we nixed the exam schools. The same if we fully funded higher Ed, it will be devalued.

I'm a BPS grade who lies about what school system I graduated from, I have too or I would break necks.

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But not everybody feels that way about being a BPS graduate.

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Is the school system.

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Again, there are good things happening in BPS. Perfect? No. But people who think it's a hellhole don't seem to have any experience with it.

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Two months prior to the exam, offer a prep 4 Saturday's in a row at a local HS.

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ISEE Test prep is not enough. Children are tracked into advanced work class beginning in grade 4 (also based on a test). If we really want all children who deserve to go to have access to schools like Latin, we need to reexamine tests as entrance criteria. We need to exams bias in the tests, and why some children always seem to be more prepared than others.

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Speaking from experience here - a good elementary school without it can also get kids ready for the exam (and, yes, we got lucky in getting a seat in a good elementary school - we need more of those).

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There are some terrific non-AWC schools/classes. But in the schools I experienced both as a kid and as a parent, the divide between the "regular Ed" and AWC was particularly stark.

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Principals at schools with AWC can choose to offer a limited number of students seats based not on the test, but 'per portfolio' - ie based on their prior school experience. As far as I can tell, this need not be based on grades, but simply the principal's assessment of a student's overall academic capabilities.

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Depending upon which test you're taking, K - 6 or K - 8 is the test prep.

Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com

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"O'Neill continued he wants officials to look at another possible issue: Whether parochial and private schools in Boston give higher grades to students than BPS students doing the same quality of work."

How long have exam schools been around??? and this is just occurring to these people????????????????

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How does that translate to better scores on a multiple choice exam?

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Whether you get into an exam school depends on two things:

1) Your score on the ISEE standardized test.
2) Your GPA.

The parochial/private issue relates to the second criterion. O'Neill said he's heard that if you take two students doing the same exact level of work, the one at the private/parochial school will be given higher grades than the one in a BPS school. If they both score the same on the ISEE test, then the private/parochial student would have a better shot at getting an acceptance letter.

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The one at the Parochial school will probably be further ahead in the field, i.e. using books grades ahead . Dilution of the product will be the end result here.

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The Catholic Schools are a way to escape the curriculum frameworks. My husband taught in a Catholic School and the kids were way behind our public school kids. They get higher grades because they get less rigorous courses, and because the principals demand that the teachers not fail students because they want their tuition dollars.

Now my son teaches public school, and has to deal with the kids moving in at 4th grade who are way behind. The Catholic School kids are the ones who need to catch up.

The whole "Catholic School Is More Difficult" is a bunch of crap anymore - and has been a myth for at least fifteen years.

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My three children went to a private school that did not give grades- think pass/fail.

The three of them are completely different and have very different levels of competence.

As each came of 'exam school age', we were asked if s/he was interested in attending an exam school. Lo and behold, they all got As and A plus marks. At least one did not deserve an A.

All three got into BLS.

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I've heard this rumor too - from other public school parents who have no way to know what is happening in other schools.

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It's great to prepare for any test, becoming a life long learner particularly of the topics on testing is the better life strategy. A false notion about using test preparation for better results is it's part of good education.

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"some black students who do get accepted to BLS turn it down because "they don't feel it's an accepting enriching environment for them.""

That sounds a lot like reverse racism, and it's not even good reverse racism. These black kids are shooting themselves in the foot turning down a path to a better life.

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It's saying they don't feel they'd be welcome at BLS. Whether that's true or not, I don't know, but if I thought I'd be picked on/bullied/ostracized because of who I am, I might think twice about going to a particular school, too.

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BLS is a no nonsense nose to the grind stone get it done and advance yourself,That is the message it projects!

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what I did hear, many times, was that parents (and kids) thought that BLS would be too intense and too academic and not nurturing enough. All of which is completely valid--I hated every minute I spent there, but my kid thrived, learned invaluable skills of time management and self-discipline, made extraordinary friends, and also learned to advocate for herself and for other students. It was a deeply imperfect school but it worked for her.

I just never heard this criticism as a racial thing, though admittedly I heard this more from white parents. There were a couple of kids in sixth grade who said openly that they didn't want to go there because it would be "too hard." I can imagine some apprehension from black parents and kids who think of it as a "white" school but really--does anyone believe that there's been a pervasively "bullying" atmosphere or one that's oppressive towards students of color?

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some black students who do get accepted to BLS turn it down because "they don't feel it's an accepting enriching environment for them."

Two questions I'd be interested in hearing answered...

1 - If they feel that way, why did they take the exam in the first place?

2 - If their feelings changed between the time they took the test and when they were told they had been accepted, what was the information - and source of same - that made them uncomfortable about attending?

Suldog
http://jimsuldog.blogspot.com

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The same exam is used for BLS, BLA, and the O'Bryant. Also, the test is only offered once a year, so a lot of kids just take it and then decide later when they get their score. They crunch the numbers and give you a ranking based on the test and grades for beginning of 6th grade and end of 5th grade.

For 7th grade enrollment (or 9th), you rank your choices, both exam schools and regular BPS offerings. IIRC, you only get a form with the exam schools if you are eligible. Kids with higher ranks get their first choice. Historically, that was always BLS first and BLA second and O'Bryant third but that has changed over time to people looking to see which school is a better fit for their kid.

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If you believe in your schools, start by giving first entrance preference to the top 10% of each 6th and 8th grade public school class .

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Keep in mind the exam schools are difficult once you attend and the entrance exam shows which kids can handle the workload. If kids get in that shouldn't be there the curriculum at the exam schools will need to be simplified accordingly. A test prep. Course on its own isn't going to bridge the gap.

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O'Neill wasn't talking about making every kid take the course; only making it available to every kid who wants to take it, rather than limiting it to the first 375 who apply.

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So what is the answer? Do we let students into BLS based on the color of their skin even if their grades/test scores are not as good as others? Is that fair to students who have worked and studied hard to get in?
Education starts at home. If a child is not read to from the time he/she is very young and education is not a priority in the home, there is less of a chance a child will do well in school. Never mind all the other factors - not getting enough sleep if a bed time is not enforced, not getting good nutrition because parents can't afford good food or don't have the knowledge about nutrition, not having a stable, loving, supportive, safe home environment... Short of taking a child from the home and putting him/her in a boarding school, there's not much we can do on the home front as it relates to education.
It would be great to get a more diverse makeup of students in BLS but the only fair way to do that is by making sure ALL elementary school students in this city get a good education and have a chance to do well on the admissions test. How is that achieved? Maybe longer school days for those children who are not succeeding? Longer school year for those not succeeding? A few months ago, I came across information about the Epiphany School in Boston. If BPS could implement elementary schools like that (without the religious aspect), I think it would go a long way in helping ensure more diversity at BLS.

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Which you couldn't impose, anyway, due to the lawsuit over the earlier quotas.

What people are arguing for is giving minority and poor students a fairer shake: Give them the same pre-test advantages their better peers have (i.e., prep classes), figure out why BLS has such a bad reputation among black kids and do something about that, etc. In other words, equal opportunity.

And, yes, at the same time, let's recognize that BLS is not for everybody and keep working to improve all the city's high schools.

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But the court ruled the quota should be x%, not y%.

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Their better peers?? (I'll assume that's a typo.)

I think giving test prep in sixth grade is good but too little too late. Giving equal opportunity for a great education needs to start when the kids are young.

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Pre test? I thought that was what the busing was supposed to accomplish. This school is all about work, either you want to do it or you dont. Why dont you just make prep courses mandatory, then revisit and make prep courses for prep courses in the future. Leave the school alone. The school system is in shambles , and now the butinskis want to lower BLS down to its level. And why ever did they destroy Boston Trade and replace it with the new and improved and soon to be newer and improved Roxbury Crossing School, whatever it is called .

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Politicize, then run for Mayor. Just wondering?

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He said it toward the end of the meeting, when the only people likely paying any attention were school officials, the people left in the room and one person watching the meeting online in his Roslindale dining room until he finally just couldn't take any more pedagogy and turned it off.

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and testing the political winds. The councilor has been MIA in defense of the libel spread against BLS "Apartheid" parents. Stay tuned.

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