Students surpass goals for petition to save program
Students who want to keep the the district’s Intensive Studies Program despite district restructuring have cause for hope.
First, the 25 or so sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders who hoped to save the program by gathering 1,000 signatures in rallies over the past week did even better than expected, collecting enough names of people who back the advanced-learning program to exceed that number, organizers say.
The names are to be presented at Tuesday’s meeting of the School Committee, along with more public comment that will expand upon the student, parent and expert testimony heard at the committee’s Oct. 18 meeting.
It will give committee members plenty of talking points as they head into a Nov. 19 roundtable on academic challenge, say parents such as John DeLancey, who has a seventh-grader at the Kennedy-Longfellow School. While critics of the program say it unfairly groups kids (in fact, the program has open enrollment) and is elitist, DeLancey notes that’s certainly not the case for his daughter’s school, which is “not elitist at all — in fact, it’s mostly immigrants and people of color.”
Another factor boosting hopes and giving committee members fodder for discussion at the roundtable was an astonishingly well-timed article in The Wall Street Journal. The Saturday item, posting only hours after students such as 12-year-old Mary Gashaw wrapped up their signature-gathering at City Hall and Central Square, bore the headline “Brightest Stall, Low Achievers Gain on Tests.”
The story, by the Journal’s Stephanie Banchero, leads off by saying, “national focus on the lowest-achieving students has helped boost their academic performance, but it has left the country’s brightest young minds behind, prompting calls to rethink how schools teach top kids” — that is, scores for the top-achieving 10 percent are stagnating or dipping.
“There is this myth that gifted and talented children will be fine on their own,” said Jane Clarenbach, director of the National Association for Gifted Children, a nonprofit advocacy group. “But I think history is showing us that this is not true, and we now have a crisis in this nation where our top achievers are being ignored.”
Proponents of gifted education say a preoccupation with the lowest performers has relegated the most promising students to unchallenging classrooms. They point to the 1990s effort to “mainstream” gifted students who previously had been taught in separate classes, and to the 2002 No Child Left Behind law, which put intense focus on the lowest achievers.
Cambridge Superintendent Jeffrey Young has said no decisions have been made on whether to retain the program. A review of it that is under way is only coincidentally taking place during the district restructuring known as the Innovation Agenda, he said, and what shape instruction for advanced learners will take is subsequently unclear.
When the committee moves to new meeting space at Cambridge Rindge & Latin School is also unknown. For now, meetings continue to be held at City Hall, 795 Massachusetts Ave., Central Square.
As a member of the School Committee I have always supported ISP and in fact, voted to expand the program a few years ago. What I have also said, however, is that I hope that our district gets to a point where we can challenge all students in their original schools, and won’t have a need for a magnet program that draws students at the expense of their elementary school.
This article says that critics say that ISP “unfairly groups kids” and is “elitist”. Does ISP group kids, yes, it does. Students have to apply to get in and they are admitted by lottery, but the truth is, it is designed to be a program for students who need and want more challenge, thus by definition, groups kids. Whether or not that is “unfair” is a bigger discussion. As far as “elitist”, who said that? No one on the SC has said it, or the Supt, to the best of my knowledge. This is not about being “elitist” or not. I understand and respect the parents and students who feel their needs aren’t being met and it is our responsibility to meet those needs. Parents have every right to seek out programs that will benefit their children. That is not elitist.
This conversation has turned to “pro ISP” or “con ISP”. The discussion should really be about “how do we meet the needs of all of our students.”
During the election, people often asked me, “will you vote for ISP?” or “Will you vote against ISP?” The truth is, we don’t have any idea what the Supt is going to propose. We don’t have any idea what the evaluation our consultants conducted will say. If the Supt comes up with something better then ISP then I will support it. If he doesn’t, then I won’t. All the information is not in yet and it is premature for anyone, including SC members, to draw a line in the sand when we don’t have all of the information.
There are many great things about ISP. It has certainly served a need. However, like all programs, we must see how it fits into our new structure. Having a magnet program that draws higher achieving students from certain “feeder” schools to certain upper schools because they have ISP may be problematic. At this point I don’t see how that fits into the Innovation Agenda.
As with many things, this is more complicated then “yes ISP” or “no ISP” and I hope the conversation shifts to how to best meet the need of these students while also doing what is best for the district.
Marc McGovern
School Committee
Mr. McGovern,
People who were in the SC, did call the ISP elitist indirectly, and also a program of tracking. Also, students in general ed. prefer classes without ISP students because then they can learn slower and at there own pace. At Tobin, students have not been learning that much do to mis-behaviors one student reported. But, students think that ISP should be a separate program because students who learn at slower paces in general ed. can learn more without having the class speeding to different lessons. Students in the general ed. participate more and feel more involved without having “ISP” students answering the questions. Students understand that general ed. should be recognized but the high achievers aren’t being recognized and taught to their own needs. If students who are struggling or need to learn at a slower pace, why can’t students who learn at a high pace, learn?
Mary Gashaw
7 ISP KLO
(using ispklopea678)