sullafelix
03-05-10, 18:36
http://theblogprof.blogspot.com/2010/03/another-symptom-of-problem-detroit.html
Friday, March 5, 2010
Another symptom of the problem: Detroit school board President Otis Mathis can't write (seriously!)
It's bad enough that Detroit Public Schools (DPS) graduates a pathetic 1 in 4 students, the worst in the nation. That obscene graduation rate is only that high because DPS commits 'social promotion' - the practice of passing students onto the next grade who are not ready, a practice that DPS emergency financial manager Robert Bobb has just ended (Detroit Public Schools Finally Ends "Social Promotion" - Passing Students That Can't Read Their Diplomas). That same Robert Bobb has been fighting with the teachers union and with the Detroit school board for academic control of the district. The school board is led by Otis Mathis, who wrote a mass email last August:
Do DPS control the Foundation or outside group? If an outside group control the foundation, then what is DPS Board row with selection of is director? Our we mixing DPS and None DPS row's, and who is the watch dog?
And here's the beginning of an email to supporters a few days ago that started with this:
If you saw Sunday's Free Press that shown Robert Bobb the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, move Mark Twain to Boynton which have three times the number seats then students and was one of the reason's he gave for closing school to many empty seats.
Apparently being a Detroit school board president and having to compose written communications is so easy even a caveman can do it. The above examples are emails in raw, unedited form as per the Detroit News. Laura Berman, a far left writer for the News has this:
The rest of the e-mail, and others that Mathis has written, demonstrate what one of his school board colleagues describes, carefully, as "his communication issues." But if these deficits have limited Mathis, as he admits they have, they have not stopped him from graduating from high school and college. In January, his peers elected him president by a 10-1 vote over Tyrone Winfrey, a University of Michigan academic officer.
"I'm a horrible writer. I know that," says Mathis, 56, a lifelong resident of southwest Detroit. His difficulties with language were spotted as early as fourth grade, when he was placed in special education classes. His college degree was held up for more than a decade because he repeatedly failed an English proficiency exam then required for graduation at Wayne State University.
So apparently Mathis himself went through DPS, which explains a lot. Now how can the board claim that they are raising standards for education when their own president can't write English? Isn't this like hiring a blind guy to teach sharp shooting? Mathis is the same guy who said this: Question to Detroit School Board President: "What if every kid failed - should someone else step in?" Ans: "NO!". Detroit's education system is so bad, 33% of working-age adults, and 44% of all adults, read below the 6th grade level. Not good enough to graduate from elementary school. 60% of students entering community colleges need to take remedial courses. And instead of demolishing the failed DPS experiment that is only creating or saving government dependency, Granholm wants to build adult education centers, RUN BY DPS, to pick up the slack. So the very people responsible for the educational failure will be in charge of bringing adults up to speed (MI to Build Center For Adults Who Can't Read Good And Wanna Learn To Do Other Stuff Good Too). Good grief.
Friday, March 5, 2010
Another symptom of the problem: Detroit school board President Otis Mathis can't write (seriously!)
It's bad enough that Detroit Public Schools (DPS) graduates a pathetic 1 in 4 students, the worst in the nation. That obscene graduation rate is only that high because DPS commits 'social promotion' - the practice of passing students onto the next grade who are not ready, a practice that DPS emergency financial manager Robert Bobb has just ended (Detroit Public Schools Finally Ends "Social Promotion" - Passing Students That Can't Read Their Diplomas). That same Robert Bobb has been fighting with the teachers union and with the Detroit school board for academic control of the district. The school board is led by Otis Mathis, who wrote a mass email last August:
Do DPS control the Foundation or outside group? If an outside group control the foundation, then what is DPS Board row with selection of is director? Our we mixing DPS and None DPS row's, and who is the watch dog?
And here's the beginning of an email to supporters a few days ago that started with this:
If you saw Sunday's Free Press that shown Robert Bobb the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, move Mark Twain to Boynton which have three times the number seats then students and was one of the reason's he gave for closing school to many empty seats.
Apparently being a Detroit school board president and having to compose written communications is so easy even a caveman can do it. The above examples are emails in raw, unedited form as per the Detroit News. Laura Berman, a far left writer for the News has this:
The rest of the e-mail, and others that Mathis has written, demonstrate what one of his school board colleagues describes, carefully, as "his communication issues." But if these deficits have limited Mathis, as he admits they have, they have not stopped him from graduating from high school and college. In January, his peers elected him president by a 10-1 vote over Tyrone Winfrey, a University of Michigan academic officer.
"I'm a horrible writer. I know that," says Mathis, 56, a lifelong resident of southwest Detroit. His difficulties with language were spotted as early as fourth grade, when he was placed in special education classes. His college degree was held up for more than a decade because he repeatedly failed an English proficiency exam then required for graduation at Wayne State University.
So apparently Mathis himself went through DPS, which explains a lot. Now how can the board claim that they are raising standards for education when their own president can't write English? Isn't this like hiring a blind guy to teach sharp shooting? Mathis is the same guy who said this: Question to Detroit School Board President: "What if every kid failed - should someone else step in?" Ans: "NO!". Detroit's education system is so bad, 33% of working-age adults, and 44% of all adults, read below the 6th grade level. Not good enough to graduate from elementary school. 60% of students entering community colleges need to take remedial courses. And instead of demolishing the failed DPS experiment that is only creating or saving government dependency, Granholm wants to build adult education centers, RUN BY DPS, to pick up the slack. So the very people responsible for the educational failure will be in charge of bringing adults up to speed (MI to Build Center For Adults Who Can't Read Good And Wanna Learn To Do Other Stuff Good Too). Good grief.