Posted on by Californiacontrarian

A Blast From the Past

While reading through past blogs, I have found some that are very eye-opening and worthy of a repeat performance. Here is one from March, 2021.

0.13 !. . . Who Failed ?

Right from the gitgo, I do not mean to imply that what you are going to read is happening in all big cities to the same extent that it is happening in Baltimore. The following story is so unbelievable that you are all going to say, “No way! Impossible!” But this story is true.

The following is from Fox 45, BALTIMORE (WBFF) 

“A shocking discovery out of a Baltimore City high school, where Project Baltimore has found hundreds of students are failing. It’s a school where a student who passed three classes in four years, ranks near the top half of his class with a 0.13 grade point average.

“Tiffany France thought her son would receive his diploma this coming June. But after four years of high school, France just learned, her 17-year-old must start over. He’s been moved back to ninth grade.

“France told Project Baltimore. ‘Why would he do three more years in school? He didn’t fail, the school failed him. The school failed at their job. They failed. They failed, that’s the problem here. They failed. They failed. He didn’t deserve that.’

“France’s son attends Augusta Fells Savage Institute of Visual Arts in west Baltimore. His transcripts show he’s passed just three classes in four years, earning 2.5 credits, placing him in ninth grade. But France says she didn’t know that until February. She has three children and works three jobs. She thought her oldest son was doing well because even though he failed most of his classes, he was being promoted. His transcripts show he failed Spanish I and Algebra I but was promoted to Spanish II and Algebra II. He also failed English II but was passed on to English III.

In his first three years at Augusta Fells, he failed 22 classes and was late or absent 272 days.

But in those three years, only one teacher requested a parent conference, which France says never happened. No one from the school told France her son was failing and not going to class.” (How is it possible that someone can be absent or tardy 272 days over three years and his mother not realize there is a problem?)

This story is obviously a travesty for this teenager, and his mother, who is not without some guilt here. But it gets worse.

Again from Fox45 in Baltimore:

“In his four years at Augusta Fells, France’s son earned a GPA of 0.13. He only passed three classes, but his transcripts show his class rank is 62 out of 120. This means, nearly half his classmates, 58 of them, have a 0.13 grade point average or lower.”

How can all of these students have been be passed along when they are failing more than half of their classes? If it was just one student, I suppose that one could say that this one student slipped through the cracks, or one could solely blame the mother for not paying attention . . . but 58 in a senior class of 120 students with a GPA of less than 0.14? 

But it gets even worse!

A Project Baltimore investigation has found five Baltimore City high schools and one middle school do not have a single student proficient in the state tested subjects of math and English. Not a single student!!

This is not only unconscionable, but to me this is criminal, as the teachers in these failing schools are getting paid to educate, but that is obviously not happening. Again who’s failing?

Whereas this school system’s failure is a catastrophe for each of these disenfranchised students, it is a calamity of enormous proportion for Baltimore. This sort of educational abandonment will effect that city for years with hundreds of students not being able to get any reasonable jobs because of grossly suboptimal reading and math skills. With no job skills how many of these kids will turn to drugs and crime?

Granted I do not know the racial make-up of the disenfranchised students  in those schools in which not one student tested proficient in either math or English, but I can make a educated guess.

Will we be hearing anything from BLM on how that organization is going to change this educational system’s failing and humiliation into an education success story? My guess is that we will fail to hear a peep from BLM about what should really matter, namely education and schools.

Will this debacle be covered on the National news, or in any of the local papers, or will they also fail to report on what is truly important ?

3/5/21

4/5/23

124 Replies to “A Blast From the Past”

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