PA NAACP opposes high school graduation test in a powerful letter to the PA State Board of Education
I’ll let members of the NAACP speak for themselves. The letter is also posted on the NAACP Pennsylvania State Conference website.
September 3, 2013
TO: The Pennsylvania State Board of Education
Cc: The House Education Committee of the Pennsylvania Assembly
The Senate Education Committee of the Pennsylvania Assembly
The Citizens of Pennsylvania
Cc: The House Education Committee of the Pennsylvania Assembly
The Senate Education Committee of the Pennsylvania Assembly
The Citizens of Pennsylvania
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People recognizes that for most people, education is the gateway to the economic mainstream; and that as such, education is a civil right.
For this reason, the Pennsylvania State Conference of NAACP Branches strongly opposes regulatory action that links the Keystone Examination to high school graduation. We call for the removal from Chapter 4 of Keystone Examinations as a high school graduation requirement. We are certain that such a regulation will create a shameful condition that defames the dream of a free society.
We base our position on the following recognitions.
1. It is clear that the regulation linking Keystone Examination scores to high school graduation is a present day form of Eugenics. Hidden under the cloak of “the business community has asked for an improved workforce”, and “colleges are concerned about the number of students needing remediation”, attaching Keystone Examinations to graduation is clearly based on the idea that it is possible to distinguish between superior and inferior elements of society through selective scores on a paper and pencil test. This is a clandestine social movement that strips children of their dignity and self worth while it fails to address or to access any of the characteristics that lead to successful