As states struggle to find ways to improve academic performance in their public schools and obtain waivers to the pending No Child Left Behind benchmarks, one state has come up with a controversial method for setting student standards. The new benchmarks will be broken down into categories that primarily run along ethnic lines. This leaves some ethnic groups, such as white and Asian students, held to a much higher standard than minority groups like black, Hispanic, and Native American students. As one might expect, this new policy has raised the ire of parents, students, educators, and civil rights groups.
The New Benchmarks
The Examiner reports that the Florida State Board of Education has proposed setting academic benchmarks in math and reading according to the following subgroups:
Proficiency rating for reading by 2018 –
- Asians 90%
- Whites 88%
- Native Americans 82%
- Hispanics 81%
- African Americans 74%
Proficiency rating for mathematics by 2018 –
- Asians 92%
- Whites 86%
- Native Americans 81%
- Hispanics 80%
- African Americans 74%
According to the Daily Caller, students with disabilities, those learning English as a second language and economically disadvantaged students will be left out of the new benchmarks completely. While this is the short-term goal proposed by the state board, members quickly point out that the long-term goal is to have 100 percent proficiency in all subgroups for math and reading by the 2022-2023 school year. That long-term goal hasn’t smoothed the feathers of many who were significantly ruffled after hearing the breakdown of the subgroups for the six-year
