Essay on Public Policy: Detroit Literacy
POL 7030 - Public Policy Implementation and Evaluation
University of Cincinnati
September 14, 2023
Many people who live in Detroit are lacking even simple literacy
skills. Children are not getting the education and assistance they need.
Some people can’t fill out basic job applications or even read their
prescription on their pill bottles. Detroit’s school system once served
as a model for the nation during the 1920s and 1930s. As the years
have gone on, this framework system has grown into something that
holds some of the lowest literacy rates in the country. In this paper, I
will discuss the fall of the system, the efforts to revitalize it, and
where it stands today. I will also discuss the policies that have been
put in place and their effectiveness thus far.
In the early 1900s Detroit’s population went from 285,704 to 993,675.
This was caused by the rapid growth of the automobile industry.
Starting in 1900, the number of kids attending school was 29,401 and
by 1920 it had reached an astounding 115,389. This was due in large
part to the amount of immigrants coming over to work in the auto
factories. Detroit began having problems on how to accommodate
these children so they started to go to school in basements or buildings
that had been rented. A man named Wales Martindale become
superintendent of the Detroit public schools in 1897 and served in his
position for 15 years. While he served in his position, he administered
important elements of the reformed educational program which
included child-study, a curriculum centered towards the kids, a
broadening of the secondary curriculum, professional education, and
intelligence testing. He also added playgrounds, kindergarten classes,
summer schools, a child study committee, annual age-grade surveys,
and programs for the crippled, blind, and mentally retarded children.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
By 1927, the system’s reputation was so phenomenal that the New
Republic stated, “Detroit’s own coordinated school system is one of
the finest in the world”. The superintendent during this time was
Frank Cody. During his time, the Detroit schools made progress in
raising teacher salaries, hiring new teachers, going through a zealous
school construction program, and receiving a reputation for being one
of the most progressive school systems in the nation with little
controversy.
The school system began to fall in the 1930s when business leaders
and their partners sought to slash school spending which helped turn
educational politics into a major area of conflict. School leaders
revised the curriculum in the high school because of the rush of poor
and working-class students to the area, and in essence agreed with
organized labor that the schools should serve as a mass custodial
institution for adolescents, which created an increased inequality
within education. Amid the Great Depression, groups that once
supported the schools withdrew their support and redefined the
schools as another un-useful public service whose maintenance kept
taxes high and profits low.
During the 1950s there was a decade of prosperity in the auto
industry. This decade was known as the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’,
or the Era of Prosperity. There also was a profound demographic
transformation that led to African-American students to become the
majority of schools in 1963. When Samuel Brownell became
superintendent in 1956 it marked the beginning of major changes with
the hiring of more black teachers, addressing the educational problems
of black children, and spending large amounts of money for new
buildings in predominately black neighborhoods.
For most of the past decade children in Detroit have had to deal with
despicable conditions within their schools. Classroom temperatures
exceeded 90 degrees during the spring and summer, and were nearly
freezing during winters. Mold and other items like it were also found
all over the walls. In one case in 2015, an eighth grader who had high
math skills had to teach other students seventh and eighth grade math
instead of a real teacher. Another case that is going on says that the
state of Michigan shoved students and teachers into schools with
environments that were not adequate in providing teachers a place to
help benefit the children. Since the National Assessment for
Educational Progress has been given beginning in 2009, Detroit fourth
and eighth graders have placed last in the country when compared
with students in other large cities. When the state decided to take over
the schools and the cut the school board and other affiliates, the
system began to fail. With so many third-graders not being at grade-
level reading, a mind-blowing 86%, this can cause them to struggle
academically in the future and throughout their entire lives. 47% of
Detroiters are also labeled as ‘functionally illiterate’. Only 10% of
people who have literacy problems have acted towards getting help to
fix it. These are very low numbers and they need to be improved.
Many organizations and policies have been put in place to try to help
these people get a better education. They want to help others obtain a
simple set of skills that will be helpful in the future.
In 2016, a report was filed against Detroit public schools about
receiving inadequate learning skills and attending schools that were
infested with rodents and did not provide certified teachers and up-to-
date textbooks. A student can recall that while he was in eleventh and
twelfth grade, he read books that were suited for third and fourth
graders. The report also says that sometimes there wasn’t even
funding to get necessary supplies to help the children learn. People are
saying that the children of Detroit are getting an education so poor
that they don’t have the necessary skill set needed to exercise their
established constitutional rights, such as the right to vote and to
participate in their nation’s democracy. This case is still ongoing and
is still not clear if it will succeed or not.
The state of Michigan has put many policies in place to help ensure
that children in Detroit get the education they need to ensure a good
future. One of these states that the children of Detroit deserve and are
entitled to a quality education. The State Board of Education agrees
that stability and respect need to be instilled in the current school
system. They welcome the public to address what they think needs to
be implemented to make sure the educational outcomes are top
notched (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). It goes on to talk about how they are waiting for the
governor’s plan on how to put a framework into place and asking for
the public’s help in this process. Regardless of economic status,
disability, language barriers and other challenges, children deserve an
education and the state wants to fix the quality of schools in the area
for everyone (‘State Board of Education Statement on Detroit School
Plans’). The policy report ends with them saying that they would also
like to reduce debt and find a new source of governance for the
schools.
Another policy put in place by the state says: “The Board does support
the plan to address the Detroit Public Schools’ debt, but we also
believe a plan for education needs to address the underlying structural
causes of financial woes that have resulted in inadequate classroom
funding needed to address the issues of the neediest children in
Michigan” (‘State Board of Education Statement on Moratorium on
Detroit School Closures’). It also states: “To address these concerns,
the Board endorses implementation of the CFDS recommendations,
particularly moving to a funding project based on the actual cost to
educate children with different levels of need, with a three-year
budget projection rather than unpredictable count-day totals each year,
and increasing state funding to eliminate debt resulting under state
emergency management” (‘State Board of Education Statement on
Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’). “We also support
immediately restoring a Detroit elected school board; and suggest that
any Commission that is appointed to ensure quality in all schools and
decide whether schools should stay open or close, has the powers to
do this and is selected by a Detroit-elected body” (‘State Board of
Education Statement on Moratorium on Detroit School Closures’).
They also want standardized testing to play a bigger role in the
schools.
Another program started in the schools is called ‘Me and the D.’. This
is an education program associated with the arts that integrates
graphics, critical literacy, and different projects into the syllabus,
which hopes to fix tensions through reimagining the instruction of
literacy and having students recreate relationships they built within
their communities. This was a yearlong initiative centered around
many different aspects to encourage students to look at how they
might change themselves and their neighborhoods but also rethink
their literacy abilities. (Filipiak and Miller). The curriculum featured
anchor texts, media projects, media skills, and writing focus. This
program paired themes like: discovering, creating, resisting, and
transforming together with reflective questions centered around
student experiences, which generated a dialect for students in which
they acted and reflected on what mattered most in their lives.
The final program I will talk about is set for the state of Michigan as a
whole. The program itself is installed by Michigan’s reading and
retention law. “With this law in place, administrators gain the ability
to hold back third graders starting in the spring if they score a low
grade on the ELA test, which tests kids on reading, writing, listening
and language” (Chambers). Instead, the state will use an exclusive
structure to score and make decisions.
Public policy is what people that hold office within governments, and
the citizens they speak for, decide what to do or not to do about public
issues. They are supposed to fix problems that the people find
unacceptable and therefore must be fixed. Policy refers to a course of
action that someone or a group of people follow in dealing with an
issue. Policies help regulate society and help channel human behavior
properly. Policies are very important in finding order in a community.
They can also help solve many problems.
Overall, I would say that the policies helped in some ways, but didn’t
solve any issues in some cases. It’s great that they are trying to find
ways to help the children, but sometimes we have to look at the bigger
picture and ask ourselves, ‘Are they really helping?. If you look at the
results of students after the Michigan reading and retention law came
into effect you will see this:
Reading proficiency scores fell for students in fifth and seventh grade
to 46.2% and 42.7%. Scores improved in fourth and sixth grades by
0.8% and 0.3%.
Math scores rose by 1% t for 3rd and 0.5% for 5th and 6th. Scores
declined 0.2% in 4th.
On the PSAT, 61.9% passed the reading section and 41.4% passed the
math section.
The worst results came in social studies. Only 17.4% of 5th and 28%
of 8th passed. 11th scored 46.6% (Chambers).
This law can be evaluated as being somewhat helpful. In most cases
the law helped improve scores in every area. You do have the one
case though where students still had score drops in social studies.
Overall, I feel like this law was very effective and helped the state not
have to hold so many kids back.
In the case of the ‘Me and the D’ program, many students gained
confidence and came out with a stronger set of skills. The program
was very helpful in integrating many parts of education to help
children out. Working together with many different people, the
program was able to build a classroom with students that wanted
human relationships which believed to transform the classroom.
Spaces that were to degrade the children would fail regardless of what
materials or teachers students were given and the changes trying to be
made would not be accomplished.
