I suggest that we create more than one level for honor level classes. Each level would move at a different pace, some covering more material and concepts than others, so each student is challeged appropriately. Our school system is so large that we have plenty of teachers and classrooms to make that happen.
It's sad that we are not allowing the smartest kids to be challenged in American classrooms, by having the classroom material taught at a slower pace than some students need. I am frustrated when my child says that he is bored in class, and has to wait for basic reading and writing material to be retaught to the entire class for a single struggling child before the actual class lesson is covered. When a child can do the homework before the teacher has even started teaching the classroom lesson, and often gets 100 percent in classwork/homework/tests, it means that there is something broken in our educational system here in Anne Arundel County.
I have witnessed that the current method is punishing higher-performing students. Not all the time, but more often than we should accept.
I believe that we can and should raise the academic bar for lower-performing students, without holding back our most talented students. Opening up honor level classes to more students was a great idea that we should keep. Every single student should be challenged. Let's make sure that happens!

Things that should also have been mentioned in the article were allowances they are making that skew the actual results of this experiment. Apparently a deadline is no longer enforced. If a child doesnt get his assignment in, he can turn it in as late as 3 weeks post due date one student mentioned and still not be penalized on his grade. Another mentioned how there is no incentive to do their best on an assignment anymore, as they can always get a redo. On pretty much anything. But to make things worse, kids are saying that they have started turning in mediocre work for their abilities and they are still receiving A's because the standards have been lowered so much. As my daughter put it "they say they are trying to make everyone advanced, but all they are doing is making everyone standard". Advanced students have learned they no longer have to go the extra mile to get good grades. They are not learning material that requires them to study, so they are not learning important study habits that they will need in high school and college. When a student who read at a 7th grade comprehension level in 2nd grade is reading a 4th grade level book in 7th grade, the system is not working to educate every child.

I was not able to attend the meeting, but did watch it after the fact on Verizon's Public Programming station. It is so hard to believe that after all of the testimonies that have taken place at all of the board meetings that the various schools continue to move forward with heterogeneous grouping/leveling. This is more than a "schedule change", it is a total overhaul from the way teachers were teaching and students were learning. That term totally dismisses the impact this change will continue to have on our children. That fact that children are talking out about not having enough challenging work to truly earn their grades is something to stop and listen to. This idea of leveling and grouping is the biggest band-aid of them all for standard and lower level learners.

What we are doing is falsifying the actual data - so true results of this will not be seen until the band-aid is RIPPED off when they get to either a high school that has the foresight NOT to "level" their classes, or if/when they arrive at college (because that is the goal after all, isn't it?) and find out that school and life is actually a lot harder than what they were experiencing - you actually have to work hard to earn those good grades, future employers won't give you a second chance, you don't get to "redo" your college exams until you get the grade you want, oh, and if you want that job you can't hand in your resume late! What in the world are we preparing those kids for? It doesn't sound like success to me, it just sounds like placating a situation - and all the while dismissing a whole other group of individuals who COULD soar much higher than they being given the opportunity to.

And don’t even get me started on referrals – when the people in charge of handing out the referrals are told by the people that employ them that they need to meet a goal of fewer referrals, of course it’s possible, it’s almost guaranteed, but are the problems really gone or are the poor behavior issues now just being tolerated in the classrooms so that everyone in the class is subject to it? During American Education Week I personally witnessed a disruptive student attempting to cheat off of another student. So, where do we go from here? It seems that lawsuits and formal complaints get the attention and action... Who do we write to that can make the Board of Ed listen, and actually put a stop to all of this?

My children's tuition is hard to swallow come payment time, but well worth the expense when I see how some public school administrators consider this good education. Weren't multiple levels created in the past to taylor subject matter to various levels of learning ability? Why are the dismantling that structure? It worked. Just another round about way to dummy down everyone and make the slow ones feel good about their deficiencies.

Hello, Annapolis, Crofton, and Central Middle School. What was the end of the story?
Does leveling work?
Were the objections of kids, teachers, and parents assuaged or heeded?
What steps would you take if you were to rewind the whole time period and do it right, from the perspective of public relations and the best interests of children?