High School Seniors Can Add a New Line to Their Résumé: Guinea Pig
You’re going to hear a lot this week about students who aren’t on track to graduate.
Data released by San Diego Unified on Friday reveals that there are a lot of them: A quarter of the current senior class is not on track to meet new graduation requirements in place for the class of 2016.
Indeed, the district has its hands full helping students adjust to those requirements and a spate of other new stuff: On top of the new so-called A-G requirements, students are working with new Common Core curriculum and tests. A new SAT test is looming, too.
I talked with a handful of students and teachers at University City High about all the new requirements. Those conversations revealed that the new system has taken a toll even on those who are on track.
The new requirements include four years of English, three years of math, history/social science and science, including a higher level of math than what was required before, and two years of the same foreign language.
University City High School senior Alison White said the new graduation requirements have squeezed most of the fun out of her schedule. She’d like to take more electives, but felt pressure to take Advanced Placement classes instead, which carry weighted grades and can help boost grade point averages.
“It’s so competitive to get into colleges,” she said. She and several classmates said they’re not getting enough sleep between all of their homework, completing college applications, plus work and community service obligations.
Pressure to take AP classes isn’t new, of course, but the new requirements can put additional pressure on students who aren’t as strong in math or science. If they are forced to re-take one of those classes to meet the new bar, that’s one fewer opportunity to explore something like music or journalism that they might actually be interested in. Taking AP classes, which are weighted, can make up for a lower grade in a math or science.
White said schools are “really pushing math and science and I have a more creative and artistic mind. Having to take more of those classes puts more stress on me.”
This year’s seniors were also the first to take the new Common Core-aligned assessment, called theSmarter Balanced test. Student results were mailed home last week after much delay by the state and included a letter from Superintendent Cindy Marten admonishing parents to remember that the test is only one indicator of a child’s progress.
Student reviews of the test, given last spring, aren’t encouraging.
“It was not user-friendly or intuitive,” White said. Students had complaints about taking the test on a computer, which not only had glitches, but was a big adjustment for students who have always been tested on paper. Taylor McCabe, a University City High School senior, said the features that were supposed to be available to help students complete the test didn’t function properly, like the embedded highlighter and calculator. “Taking it on a computer was horrific,” said Cameron Doyle, also a UCHS senior.
The students I talked with gave varying reviews of the Common Core-aligned curriculum. That appears to depend largely on teachers. Susan Bristol, a University City High School English teacher, has been teaching critical thinking skills all along, and there are explanations all over her classroom about the Common Core State Standards. The changes are almost unnoticeable for her students.
But it’s been a rocky transition elsewhere. “They’re still working out the kinks” in math classes in particular, White said. “They’re trying to make math into more than it is. Math is pretty black and white, but they’re making it gray, which is more confusing.”
For students who want to make up a grade by retaking a class, it means less room in their schedule High School Seniors Adjusting to Spate of New Systems: