I just read the article fretting over the fact that SAT Reading scores for last year were the lowest ever on record. Yes, that is troubling and likely says a lot about us as a society--our unwillingness to financially support education to the level it deserves and our ongoing love affair with our electronics--but I'm not ready to press the panic button just yet.
The article went on to say that a benchmark for college freshman year success is to score a 1550 or above on the test. In a study of 100 colleges, the students who had achieved that score had averages of B- or above. Last year, only 43% of test-takers hit the 1550 mark. The average score was 1003.
I can only look at my own experience for perspective. I scored a 990 on the SAT, not even worthy of "average" by last year's standards. My high school counselor called me into his office for a meeting over my test performance. I vaguely recall a phrase like "I expected you to score much higher than this" being uttered. Then he pulled out a stack of papers: college admissions guidelines and incoming student expectations. Of course I fell back on the standardized test bias: I scored higher in Math than in Critical Reading, a huge tip-off that something in Princeton, New Jersey was out to get me. (Subsequently I have met many people who have similar stories of outscoring their better subject area.)
So I suppose after that conference I could have thrown in the collegiate-striped towel and gone into radio. I had a job offer to DJ at a local station and my eye on a particular Datsun 380 ZX--black-and-gold--parked inside the mall for some drawing. My cousin and I seriously weighed the merits of this choice for weeks. But I had been raised with that "college expectation" so common in families with only one or no generations of college attendees or grads. So someone else would be the DJ, someone else would drive the Datsun.
Then, at the prodding of my AP English teacher I took the ACT...and got a 4-out-of-5. I exempted the first year of English in college, attended a branch of the state university near my home over the summers, and graduated with close to a 3.0 in three years. I did well enough on the very difficult Graduate School English Exam (GRE: Advanced English Exam)--a half-day-long affair--that I was accepted into the Master's Program for Comparative Literature. That SAT score had nothing to do with any of those accomplishments.
I don't know of too many people who made 1550, but did have another cousin who aced the SAT with a perfect score--he's an engineer now. But I do know a lot of people I consider intelligent. I even know of more than one who never attended college who are geniuses, photographic recall or not.
Would I like to see improvements in our public education system? Sure. Do I think the kids have way too tough a time getting reading and writing under their belts? I see it all the time. I've even tried to make a difference for the kids around me in those areas for years now.
I heard (I think it was on Thom Hartman's program on Free Speech TV--coming to you proudly from Denver, CO) that for the first time, the generation entering the workforce was less prepared than the generation exiting the workforce. That too is troubling. But so many paradigms are shifting in our world and culture that I'm still not quite ready to toss in that towel.
Because you just never know how things are going to turn out or why. I say let's do whatever we can to volunteer time, let's pay into the education system with our taxes, and let's keep the pressure on not just the school districts, but also the politicians to put education first. Oh, and I guess we really could read more and watch less--a tough pill I have yet to fully swallow!
But let's not allow the screaming headlines to discourage us or our kids. If we tell them they're no good they will damned sure live down to that assessment. If, on the other hand, we invest in them all that we can, they will get the message that they are worthy of the best teachers, the challenging assignments, and the free time to explore whatever it is that makes them feel alive.
And hang on to that towel like Linus with his blanket because things always seem to have a way of "coming out" in the wash.
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