Parents need say in report card revisions

By Kelley Landine
Guest Columnist

It was with great interest I read the article entitled, "Student report cards to get major revision" in your March 19 edition of the Town Common.
As a teacher (I am adjunct at Quinsigamond Community College, and formerly taught at Southbridge High School) and a parent, I am all for implementing best practices. However, this has to be a team effort, not just something the Superintendent's Office should decide on solo.
If this were a team effort, as Superintendent Daniel Durgin implies, why are the school committees in the towns affected in the dark on details, so much so in fact, they could not comment for your article. Furthermore, a building Principal (Mr. Dan Carlson, Burgess) referred to it as a major revision, but later stated he was not fully apprised of the details.
Well then, who is? As a member of the Sturbridge MOMS Club, the Brookfield Mother's Group and the Brookfield Elementary PTO, I emailed more than 75 mothers, none of whom seemed to have any clue about such a major overhaul.
Bottom line - the report cards are for the parents. No parent was consulted or informed about these new report cards. I only heard it because I have a few friends who are teachers in the other towns. I know for a fact towns in Western Massachusetts who are about to implement had an entire professional development day Friday, March 12 to work on it – together - where the teacher's input was welcomed. Then the plan was to post it on the school Web site for parent's feedback in those towns, and if warranted and sensible, changes will be made, and then the report card who go into effect.
Not in the Tantasqua towns. This seems quite the opposite - teachers and principals were told this was what was going to happen, and parents have never been told until now. Do we honestly believe a parent can't figure out that a "B-" tells them little about their child's performance? We were raised on this system. Will teachers stop grading book reports with letter grades? I assume that if we are moving to a scale of 1-4, that I can expect to see my child come home with a 4 on her aced spelling test and not 100? How is this numerical system of four numbers more telling? Superintendent Durgin told me a comments section would appear on the report cards. I have used the IPass system. These comments are not individualized; it's merely a drop down menu, choosing a canned comment. That's certainly a one size fits all solution, not a deeper analysis.
Has there been an uprising from parents demanding a report card that's more in line with the MCAS program? I don't know. I tend to doubt it, since most parents realize the need for assessment, but don't see the MCAS exam as the answer.
As a teacher for over a decade, I have seen the decline in student skills, and worse, I see students dislike learning more and more. Why? This isn't the school system we were raised in, where teachers were given the freedom to teach with expression and inspiration. Principals have to worry about meeting MCAS AYP, and this worry falls on the teacher's shoulders. How can this be healthy?
Obviously, there needs to be assessment of student's skills. Thanks to No Child Left Behind, standards are federally mandated. As Mr. Durgin stated at the March 8 school committee meeting when asked about this subject he stated that graded report cards are subjective.
It's true, but we also need to trust teacher's judgment. From my own experiences with my daughter at Brookfield Elementary, I completely trust anything her teachers tell me about her performance. Yes, now each student is measured the same - but each student is not the same.
As parents and taxpayers, we are, essentially the employer of the Superintendent. Shouldn't we have more say on something that is for ourselves?
When I made this statement to the Superintendent at this month's school committee meeting at Brookfield Elementary School, he had no response, but told me parents are aware. That is a complete falsehood. No parent was aware at that time. He also stated meetings will be held later in the spring, and communication will go home, but this was going to be implemented. That's very rogue, I believe.
Report cards do not fall under "policy" so there is little the school committees can do. Brookfield is lucky to have a superb committee, but they have no power. The district school improvement plan requires a parental communication component. That's not happening, clearly. Most people are hearing this for the first time from your newspaper, not the school.
In Brookfield, School Committee meetings are held once a month at 6 p.m. This isn't exactly convenient for parents to attend. Obviously, as parents it's time we right this ship, but how? I muse that the public access portion of the meeting comes before new business. How can a parent voice anything? They have to wait until the next meeting the following month.
Regardless of how you feel about the new reporting system (personally I see benefits as well as detriments) parents should have been asked to be on committees to steer this. So who will the fallout land on? The teachers, and then the Principals - that's the line - so the Superintendent can make decisions that others have to bear gripes for. It's turning into Team Parents/Teachers versus Superintendent. Something is clearly wrong here. Parents need to go to meetings and get involved, and we have to protect our kids and teachers.
It seems teachers are in it for the kids, and the administration is in the business of kids. This isn't a corporation. Our children are not factory products, and you can't just decide that the new hip trend (standard based report cards) is right for our children without having input from the people this report card is designed for.


Kelly Landine is a resident of Brookfield.