DD,
   At some point we should just agree to disagree given very different 
views of the world and enormously different values. But it does bother 
me that you seem not to believe the facts I am trying to report.
   On values issues: I care also what happens on America's farms, though 
I am not a farmer. If my tax dollars are needed to give farmers tax 
breaks, I am willing to do that. Farms need customers, and consumers 
need farms. Our current interest in alternative fuels is driving up the 
cost of corn. I'm not sure how or why you want to draw these "us against 
them" kinds of lines.
   I just can't see the need for "triage" in education or these budget 
formulas which assume we don't have the money to do the job. We are a 
rich nation, and we will be far the richer if we adequately fund all our 
schools. It is an investment, not a drain.
   My students are "superior", but the admissions profile may not show 
that. That's the whole point. I also teach at a world class university. 
There is no "dumbing down." The mission of my program is to help 
students be successful in very demanding university programs, not to 
lobby for relaxation of standards. We do just that. You want to explain 
it away without questioning your own narrow view of the world.
   My interest in grammar comes in part from an interest in demystifying 
literacy. To the extent that we can do that, success will be less and 
less an accident of birth and more and more a result of good schools and 
good teaching.
   I understand your position that there are perhaps millions of 
students out there who should be allowed to fail because we don't have 
the resources we need to teach them. I would challenge your belief that 
these students are unteachable or that we have tests that are capable of 
culling them out.  It is a position that seems grounded in narrowly 
conceived self interest, not in science. Quite frankly, it seems more 
fascist than democratic.

Craig
  
  

DD Farms wrote:
> At 12:23 PM 9/18/2007, Craig Hancock wrote:
>> DD,
>>   As a professional educator, I think I should concern myself very 
>> much with finding approaches that give my students the best chance at 
>> success.
>
> DD: An excellent idea. "Success at what?" should be part of the 
> mission statement. How to allocate your scarce resources, time, and 
> perhaps money, is an economic question. Needs to be addressed. Some 
> say do it so that the ones who do really well on the subject material 
> prosper, some say cut out those at the ends and aim for the middle. 
> {Those at the top will get it anyway, and the ones at the bottom won't 
> ever.} That should be in the mission statement, too. Economically, you 
> go for the place where marginal investment and marginal costs equate, 
> given the budget restraint.
>
>> This is especially true of teaching writing, which isn't just a 
>> content area that can be lectured to them. I also think I have an 
>> obligation as a citizen to care deeply about what is happening in our 
>> inner cities. (The people running our cities are us, insofar as we 
>> have a democracy.)
>
> DD: Why me, Oh Lord? I live on a farm in rural land. [Rural middle of 
> the muddle of Middle Tennessee.] I don't vote in or pay taxes in the 
> City. I don't run the cities at all. Don't vote for their politicians, 
> either. Do send tax money, though. Have no voice in how it is spent.
>
>> I'm not a big fan of no child left behind, but I do think our schools 
>> should be accountable, and I think teachers fall too easily into a 
>> pattern of blaming parents, neighborhoods, the media, and so on, and 
>> not their own teaching.
>
> DD: So true. But the schools seem to have no clearly assigned 
> missions. Who is to blame? All of the above.
>
>>   What I worry about with tests like the SAT is that people think 
>> they measure capabilities rather than a rather narrowly defined 
>> current ability. My experience has been that they underestimate the 
>> abilities of many students.
>
> DD: And overestimate, too. Test validity it is called.
>
>>   I don't think you meant the analogy to go that far, but my students 
>> are not Forest Gumps in any way, shape, or form. If they want to be 
>> doctors, they have to pass the same chemistry courses as other 
>> students. To an extent unpredicted by their admissions profiles, they 
>> are doing just that.
>
> DD: I rather doubt that. Either you are getting a vastly superior 
> group, or they have dumbed down the requirement to fit the class. 
> Still, you did specify "their admissions profiles." I would gather 
> that they are not reliable, and hence lose on validity, in the 
> statistical sense. Now how well does the SAT predict? R of .85?
>
>>  I think it's naive to think that success in this country is merely a 
>> matter of hard work and innate ability.
>
> DD: If you don't work hard, or have innate ability, better both, the 
> chances of success are slim.
>
>> Like good doctors, we can't turn away patients on the grounds that 
>> they deserve to be sick.
>
> DD: No, in the military and in the emergency rooms it is called 
> triage. You go for the ones who can be saved if you intervene, ignore 
> those doomed to falter, and get to those who will survive, more or 
> less, with out your attention, after taking care of the first group. 
> Rather like most schools do with their students.
>
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