Reading Mr. Wayne Scott’s letters of the past months, I find a
few points of partial agreement with him.
Reading Mr. Wayne Scott’s letters of the past months, I find a few points of partial agreement with him. First, the current trig text used at GHS, which I assume is the one Mr. Scott had a hand in selecting, is a vast improvement over its predecessor.
Second, Mr. Scott avers that Saxon “would be a disaster at GHS.” I can agree that Saxon Calculus would not be adequate preparation for the AP exam; however, I think that Saxon 54 through Advanced Mathematics are excellent texts. Methinks they should be adopted.
Third, I think that Mr. Scott is to be commended for having 58 percent of his 2003 calculus class pass the AP exam. Congratulations.
I find no more points of agreement.
In his most recent letter, Mr. Scott expands upon his theme that SAT and AP statistics should not be analyzed. This time he quotes the College Board Web site, saying that SAT aggregate scores “should not rank or rate teachers, educational institutions, districts, or states solely on aggregate scores derived from tests that are intended primarily as a measure of individual students.”
He also very kindly provides the Web address. At that site, www.collegeboard.com/about/news_info/cbsenior/yr2002/html/related.html , on the very same page, the College Board also says that “educators, the media, and others … should use aggregate scores in conjunction with other factors, such as the number of courses taken in academic subjects, scores on other standardized tests; pupil/teacher ratios; teacher credentials; expenditures per student; participation rates; retention/attrition rates; graduation rates, and other outcomes for … evaluation of the general direction in which education in a particular jurisdiction is headed, curriculum development, faculty staffing …, monitoring teacher development and curricular effectiveness over time.”
Excuse me, but I thought that Dispatch columnists and staff writer were doing exactly that? We are the media. We are looking at SAT scores, AP scores, MAP scores, API scores, CAHSEE scores, graduation rates, and the fact that GHS is applying for a waiver from the requirement that all students pass at least algebra.
On the basis of that information, we are attempting to evaluate the direction in which GUSD is headed. It appears that something needs to be fixed, and we, at least the columnists, are suggesting ways to fix it. I commend Superintendent Edwin Diaz for making improvement in our math instruction an “area of concern.”
I confess myself puzzled by Mr. Scott’s campaign of letter writing. I reviewed his letters and the articles and columns to which he objected on www.gilroydispatch.com. Any reader not heartily sick of the whole debate is invited to do the same. I found:
• On March 5, 2004, Lori Stuenkel wrote a straight news article about the ongoing efforts of GHS parents to end open enrollment for honors and AP courses. She never named Mr. Scott; her only allusion to his class was a peripheral: “Last year, of 36 students who took the AP statistics test, six passed with a score of 3 to 5.”
• In response, Mr. Scott wrote in, March 12, accusing Ms. Stuenkel of a questionable level of journalism, unfairness, political purposes, throwing statistically invalid numbers around, and non-objectivity. He accused her of asserting that his course content or qualifications were substandard.
• On April 16th, columnist Doug Meier wrote sarcastically about what constitutes “a good fit” at GHS: a valid topic, I believe, in view of the school district’s continuing use of the term when they lay off neophyte teachers. Mr. Meier never mentioned Wayne Scott, or his classes, or math.
• In response, Mr. Scott said Mr. Meier was off kilter, said he was part of the problem, and dared him to teach at GUSD. He also classified him with me and the Alliance for Academic Excellence, using the derogatory term “ilk.”
I responded, he responded, the acrimony escalated. From my perspective, Mr. Scott’s behavior borders on the paranoid as he objects to any of the unannointed daring to cite statistics. He attacks like a junkyard dog, when he is not insulted, indeed, when he is not even mentioned.
I hope he keeps writing in. I think parents should know what sort of a man is teaching their children. Writing is so revealing of one’s character.
