Education letters

Students live up to teacher expectations

At one time, during my career as an educator, I was an instructional coordinator for a number of elementary schools.

One of my responsibilities was to go into the schools, observe teachers in their classrooms and then meet with them to offer feedback and support.

AJC columnist Maureen Downey’s article, “Are They Unteachable? (Opinion, June 8),” allowed me to reflect back to classroom situations I found in many schools.

When I followed the same group of students, after they changed classes and walked into another teacher’s classroom, I often observed significant differences in the classroom environment, behavior of the students and involvement in instruction. The subject being taught was not a factor. It was the teacher.

I agree with educational consultant Martin Haberman when he talked about the importance of a teacher believing that he or she could make a difference in the lives of children. I believe that teachers do not have to be cheerleaders or have charismatic personalities to do this. They do have to provide a calm, structured, supporting classroom environment. They don’t give up on their students and realize that success comes with effort and persistence.

The reputation and respect for these kind of teachers spread throughout the school and community. Students know that when they come into the classroom. If we could clone those teachers and put them in every school in America, columnists would be writing about the success of our schools, not the failure.

Jerry Schwartz, Alpharetta

Delta CEO needs to look beyond data, scores

When Delta Air Lines CEO Richard Anderson recently bemoaned the relative lack of quality of Georgia’s public schools and their high dropout rates, he overlooked an important point: Many Georgia children are receiving a remarkable education at our public schools.

It’s true that Georgia public schools are challenged by many factors — demographic trends, language differences, economic disparities in our social fabric and a persistent lack of funding. But, despite all this, every day kids from all segments of society attend public schools to learn together, whether their future involves college or not. I attended a recent middle school awards day and saw kids win academic and social-action awards, including disadvantaged students who were recognized for achieving perfect scores on the CRCT test this year. I marveled at the accomplishments of these students and the dedicated teachers and administrators who take pride in their students’ success.

Dropout statistics and test scores paint only part of the picture. The fact is many schools throughout Georgia are a vibrant and critical part of their community and their students’ lives. The addition of relocating Northwest Airlines families from the excellent schools in Minnesota would only strengthen and improve our public schools. Mr. Anderson might also advise those folks to come on down, pitch in and join in the fun!

Bertis Downs, Athens

Four-year colleges are the rip in the seam

The article “Merger of colleges urged in Georgia (News, June 1),” recognizes the importance of providing “seamless education.”

As the first chief academic officer of Gwinnett Tech, I and then-President Alvin Wilbanks created plans to initiate establishing the institution as a two-year college. Our plan was from the beginning to offer multiple programs — certificate, diploma and degree — that enabled students to apply previous credit toward completion of core courses at any accredited two-year or four-year institution.

Throughout my tenure, we engaged in many discussions with University System of Georgia personnel and member institutions in an effort to establish articulation credit for parallel courses in our programs.

There was continuous stonewalling. Establishing committees that went nowhere were the norm. The fact is these institutions refuse to recognize that if they didn’t teach it, a course taught at a two-year technical college could still stand up to the academic quality and rigor of their purported course standards.

Unless this effort is a directive from the legislative and executive branches and attached to funding priorities, it will continue to receive lip service.

Morris Friedman, retired vice president of academic affairs, Gwinnett Technical College

CRCT is not a reliable measure of competency

The Georgia Department of Education reported improved scores on the CRCT, yet what does this really mean?

The CRCT was altered after so many students performed poorly last year, and too many of the questions on the CRCT are well below grade level.

For example, a sample question from the fifth-grade math practice CRCT asks what number times 25 equals 25. Of course, the answer is 1, and, of course, this question is well below fifth-grade level expectations.

It must also be noted that parents are reporting their children are taking five to 10 to 40 practice tests before to get ready for the CRCT. Even with low scores counting as passing, far too many easy questions and testlike items being taught months before the test, 30 percent of Georgia public school students failed the eighth-grade math CRCT. This is a serious problem.

Parents must be told the truth: If their children cannot pass the CRCT, their children are in need of intensive educational programming and remediation.

The test is simply too easy, and too few questions must be answered and/or guessed correctly to pass.

Parents should not use the CRCT as an educational appropriateness gauge.

Chris Vance, Atlanta

If special ed counted, Gwinnett would be last

So Gwinnett County is one of five finalists for the best urban school district in the country.

That may well be, but by what means has the county accomplished that end? If one talks to parents of special needs children, one will discover that Gwinnett has accomplished its success on the backs of children with disabilities. The county is committed to providing only what is minimally required by law to these children.

Gwinnett’s goal is to save money on the education of these children to spend educating the best and brightest in the county.

When it comes to educating children with special needs, Gwinnett could well be competing as one of the five finalists for the country’s worst district.

Brad Tucker, Lilburn

Merger debate shut out community colleges

I most heartily agree with assistant professor Greg McLean’s guest column (“Merging schools cheats students,” Opinion, June 1) and believe his comments should be heeded. There are far more disadvantages than advantages in merging Georgia’s technical trades colleges with community academic colleges.

What galls me further is how Gov. Sonny Perdue threw the democratic process out the window and decided on a proposal without hearing from faculty from community colleges.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my teaching experience as an adjunct instructor at Georgia Perimeter College for the past 15 years.

Teaching in a merged system will not be nearly as enjoyable for professors, instructors, staff employees and, especially, conflicted students.

Jack Bona, Chamblee