I wanted to come back to this thread an give updates to a couple of items here...

Those same students who took the placement test last time were tutored, and took the placement test again in April. This test allows the local 2 year community college to let them know if the students are ready for college level math and English, so there are four tests... if you pass the 2 English, you get into English 101, and the two math are Algebra and a college level math exam. Of the 66 students who took the exam only 4 passed the Algebra. Now remember, we have a state high school graduation requirement of an algebra Exam, so all 66 students had to have passed that state Algebra exam to be able to graduate. They didn't have the numbers for the other exams at the meeting but said they would get them for us.

Speaking of those high school exams to graduate. At first the state required you to pass four, English, Algebra, Biology and U.S. National State and Local Government (or NSL). Then last year, they stopped the NSL requirement only to this reinstate it. It turned out the only reason they stopped the NSL was due to budget cuts, there was just not enough money to pay for all the testing! So for class years 2014-2016, there will not be the NSL requirements, they get a free pass due to lack of money. They still need to take the actual course though.

Finally, I wrote about Brian Betts, the amazing teacher and principal who sadly was taken too soon from the education world. There were four suspects charged in his murder and a mother of one of them was charged for using Mr. Betts credit stolen credit card, all of them took plea deals. The school where he was principal sadly, Chancellor Rhee who strongly supported Mr. Betts and students is no longer there and the program Mr. Betts put into place there of allowing the middle school students who WANTED to stay there in the building for their high school grades and not transfer to "high school" as they felt they would have a better learning opportunity with the teachers and in the smaller building away from the "high school" society, was cancelled by the new Chancellor.

There is a brand new short video about Mr. Betts from both the student's perspective and also explains Mr. Betts view on education.