MY THOUGHTS ON HONOR ROLLS AND HIGH HONOR ROLLS IN KATY ISD HIGH SCHOOLS:
Following are two letters. The first is one I wrote to the Katy Times Editor--it explains the issue as I saw it. The second letter is one I wrote to a parent after the Board meeting when the parent responded to my letter. I've changed the name of the parent and the school for obvious reasons.
Editor
Katy Times
Sincerely,
Mary McGarr
[Note that since I wrote this letter, the SAT has been dumbed down and scoring is different; UT and A&M only accept the top 10% of high school grads, but the use of the "High Honor Roll" and "Honor Roll designation has remained the same--mediocrity is still rewarded! This quote is from the "KISD Student Handbook":
High Honor Graduates
- GPA of 4.0000 and above. These students are awarded a gold cord for graduation. • Honor Graduates - GPA of 3.5000 through 3.9999. These students are awarded a silver cord for graduation.]*******************************************************************************************************************************
I wrote this letter to a parent while I was on the school board. I had been trying to address the "honor roll" and "high honor roll" designations that are used for graduating seniors in the Katy schools. It has always been my opinion, that unless students take AP course work and have more than a 4.0 average, they are NOT honor or high honor students. As was pointed out by Dave Mundy in a column in the Katy Times many years ago, almost half of all students each six weeks make the "honor roll." Given that grade inflation is rampant and proved as being very much a part of the grading system in KISD, it just seems as though someone should have made this an issue, so I did!
Boy did I get the retorts. This first letter was sent to a man
who tried to tell me his child deserved to be among those so
honored at graduation.
Dear XXXXX:
I am not sure how an argument
based on fact somehow became a “ruse” in your mind, and I am pretty sure that I am wasting
my time with ANOTHER explanation, but the teacher in me will not allow such fallacious
reasoning to go unchallenged!
Your inability to understand the
concept of academic excellence seems to be at the root of your problem.
I am not sure why anyone cannot understand that students who take many honors
courses and make “A’s” in them and who have grade point averages that place them in the
top 5% of their class, are superior and more deserving of a “high honors” designation than
those students who do not, can not or will not take honors' courses, or who take these
courses and cannot make “A’s” in them. Stop reading right here if you do not understand
these statements because the rest of this letter will slip right past you.
Your diatribe appears to be based
upon a dearth of factual knowledge. I am not
sure to what “subjective value judgments” you allude, but yes, having served on the KISD
Board of Trustees for four years does afford me the privilege of having valid opinions
about the state of education in our school district.
If you had been committeed to death, sat in endless boring meetings, listened to
thousands of anxious parents whose children have gotten short shrift at their school and
scores of teachers who were totally frustrated with the system, then you might be able to
understand why I am indeed entitled to have opinions, especially when
they are based in fact, on anything I want!
Do not misunderstand; I asked for this job, and I enjoy doing it.
I have been served well by a 16
year long Texas public education, and it grieves me that students no longer receive that
same fine education. Giving back is, I think, a worthy reason for seeking to serve, but
it's not the only reason I serve. It
is extremely frustrating to be the only person in this school district who has tried
consistently for the past fourteen years to improve the overall academic excellence of
this school district and then have some dullard like you berate my efforts because you are
unable to fathom the meaning of true academic excellence.
I am happy that your son received
the “high honor” designation at KHS last spring.
If he were indeed one of the eighteen students in the top 5% of the class, then he
earned that honor. If he was not, then the
school district, and his family, have lied to him about his abilities, and that is the
crux of the problem. You need to go back and read the Katy Times editorial on Nov.
8, 1995 where the editor pointed out that over 50% of the students in Katy schools are
listed as being “honor roll students” each six weeks and how ridiculous that situation is.
With regard to your obvious
failure to understand the difference between the cut-off score for college admission and
the “average” score of the entering freshmen, let me point out that most Texas high
schools are no different from ours, and a great many students in the top 25% of the class
do not make the SAT cut off score, but are allowed to enter these colleges based on being
in the top quartile, or are allowed to enter in the summer, and if they are able to do
college level work are allowed entry in the fall, thus the lowered average score.
Although
you accuse me of “making superficial adjustments to our system,” I maintain that it is
easy, as you have done, to point out the deficiencies of our school district.
The difficult part is to offer reasonable solutions to improve upon our system, and
I have done that with great regularity over the last fourteen years.
For you to be unaware of those efforts means you perhaps have not been paying
attention.
MY Katy Plan was written several
years ago and has hundreds of suggestions to improve upon the academics in our district.
I have given copies to other board members, the superintendent, the administration,
principals, the teacher’s association, individual teachers and parents, and anyone else
who acted interested. I am even sending you a copy. So
far, because of lack of Board support, our district is still on its same mediocre course.
We have potentially marvelous students, obviously supportive parents, and verified
outstanding teachers but a lousy curriculum and methodology!
Like so many others, you prefer
to live in a world where lying to students about their abilities just for the sake of
their self-esteem makes perfect sense. Telling
students the truth, Mr. XXX, is a more honorable course.
Mary McGarr