The boys’ volleyball team at Kepler Neighborhood School, mostly 7th and 8th graders, went for a run over a bridge near the school. They spotted a woman attempting suicide, dangling from the bridge. They raced to ask their coach what to do. He said, “Tell her that her life matters,” as he dialed 911. The boys ran to the woman and told her again and again that her life matters, that people care about her, that she must not give up.
She pulled herself up. She did not commit suicide. The boys persuaded her to go on living.
According to the NAEP data, Fresno schools and students are among the lowest performing in the nation. Their scores are very low.
What do you think of those kids in Fresno now? Put another way, what do you think about using the scores to judge the worth of these boys?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Students are not the sum of their test scores, and teachers are not the scores of their students. These are more “reform” myths!
As someone that spent a career working with ELLs from some of the poorest nations in the world, many of the students had low test scores due to lack of education and English proficiency. Many of these students were amazing human beings that were intelligent, caring, kind and helpful. They overwhelmingly showed more respect for their parents than many typical American students. Many of these students came from war torn countries where they witnessed unspeakable violence; yet they were resilient and competent. I marveled at how well they coped with adapting to our culture and how they kept a sense of humor even though they lived in poverty. We should not judge students by their test scores. We should judge them on “the content of their character.”
The Fresno students showed empathy and compassion for another troubled human being. This type of behavior is far more valuable than any score on a bubble test.
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Amen. And, of course, the high-stakes standardized tests currently being used in English language arts are neither valid nor reliable. They are superb examples of a general dictum: garbage data in, garbage data out: https://bobshepherdonline.wordpress.com/2019/03/24/how-to-prevent-another-parcc-mugging-a-public-service-announcement/
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Mad Hatters’ Claim
“Testing matters
Nothing more”
Mad as hatters
That’s for sure
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I did research for an article on Fresno schools some years ago. Unless things have changed considerably, along with a high percentage of low-income Mexican/Central American immigrants from non-English-speaking homes, Fresno has a high Hmong immigrant population — a culture that doesn’t have a written language tradition, which puts the students at an extra disadvantage in this country. So it’s really a quintessential situation of test scores reflecting the demographics. And obviously, as everyone says, that in no way reflects on the actual worth of the students.
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I want all my students to grow up to be the kind of people who would seek to do positive things that impact the lives of others. That’s what these children did. Yes, the words came from the coach, but this experience will stay with those children forever. I had tears as I read this- it’s still sitting open on my desk – I keep thinking about the impact of their actions and the potential impacts moving forward- for the students, their coach, and most of all the woman and all who know her. Yes, we are so much more than a single score. We are human beings.
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This is why Fresno’s public schools are ranked so low — it has nothing to do with test scores.
“Fresno County has more children living in communities of concentrated poverty than anywhere else in California.
“About 40 percent of Fresno County children live in poverty, according to a Children Now report released Tuesday. The report tracks child welfare and well-being in part by the number of children who are not living in communities of concentrated poverty. That number is 53 percent in Fresno County, ranking it last in the state.
“Those numbers are worse for minority students, with 38 percent of Fresno County’s black children not living in communities of concentrated poverty, and 44 percent of Latino children not living in those communities.
“280,951children living in Fresno Count” …
Read more here: https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/education/article114766498.html#storylink=cpy
I wonder when MAGA man will come out and say how he only likes people that do not live in poverty just like he said “I like people who weren’t captured (he was referring to John McCain being a POW)”
Wait, DT already said it when he called poor countries around the world “shithole” countries.
In MAGA Mans’ mind, anyone who wasn’t fortunate enough to be born into wealth is a loser.
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I spent 36 years teaching in Fresno, 27 middle school, 9 high school. In the vast majority, my students were terrific young men and women. They worked hard, and loved the novelty we introduced into our program especially at the last school I taught at. Parents bought into our program and that of the school in general. Attendance leaped to #3 in the district and suspensions/expulsions dropped to 3rd lowest. Yes, most of them came from poverty and there were 48 distinct languages or dialects spoken on campus, but kids, faculty and community worked together to make a first class school. I love this community and the people who make it such a great place to live.
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Parallel situation- Trump’s private school. (Although, Donald wouldn’t be running due to “bone spurs”). He would have asked the lady if she was here legally. and, if she wasn’t, he’d call her country a shithole country and tell her she was better off…..
If she was from this country and had money, he’d try to enroll her in Trump University. He’d, sign up her kids, if she had them, in the grifter schools that DeVos’ department funds, rob her of future Medicare benefits she earned, make her pay a higher tax rate than the rich, threaten her future Social Security, deny her ACA benefits and have her appear before a judicial process flooded with Federalist judges looking out for corporations. She’d be forced to pay a toll for use of the bridge
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FYI – Kepler is a church-affiliated charter school.
Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone
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This winter, did they go to D.C. to participate in the rallies to deny women reproductive health care? Is the affiliated “church”, Gulen-linked? What’s the church’s policy on LBTQ rights?
Too many ideologies associated with religious groups are divisive and harmful. I don’t want my tax dollars supporting them. The ones that are politically right wing promote an authoritarian patriarchy instead of democracy e.g. Trump’s Jay Sekulow.
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Nice kids.
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But what about Amazon? What about your previous post about “Sox”? Jobs are going to computers faster and faster these days. What are these kids going to do for work?
This question isn’t a challenge, it’s sincere.
I agree these are great kids, but how are we helping them after they turn 21? Especially during poor economic times, and if we should believe in climate change and a rising national debt, poor economic times are our future.
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The unemployment rate in Fresno is 5 percent.
“Fresno’s extreme poverty puts the city in a bad spot on a national list”
“Poor neighborhoods are those where at least 40 percent of four-person families earn an annual net income of less than $25,100, according to federal standards.”
5 percent unemployment with 40 percent poverty means a lot of families are working for poverty wages and barely surviving. There probably aren’t that many jobs that pay liveable income. Even if a child has a decent education and goes to college, to earn a decent income means they will probably have to leave the valley.
Fresno is in California’s central valley and that is an extreme agriculture area. I earned my BA in journalism at Fresno State University and lived in Fresno for three years. The only job I had while I was there was working one summer for Gallo Winery that’s located close to Fresno.
“California’s Central Valley is the state’s agriculture hub, producing over 360 products. California is the sole producer of more than 13 fruits, vegetables and nuts including walnuts, olives, clingstone peaches and sweet rice. California is also the nation’s largest dairy producer with over 1/5th of the Nation’s dairy.”
Most of the jobs in the San Joaquin Valley are in agriculture and those jobs pay poverty wages.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article209826869.html
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