Last week, Randy O’Connor wrote a letter to the editor extolling
the virtues of Gilroy High School. I applaud his enthusiasm, and
agree with him that there are many talented students at the high
school.
Last week, Randy O’Connor wrote a letter to the editor extolling the virtues of Gilroy High School. I applaud his enthusiasm, and agree with him that there are many talented students at the high school. His letter also leads me to believe that he has not been following the recent debate about the English Department, because everyone in Gilroy seems to be in agreement on the outstanding job that Gilroy High School does with their band, music and art programs.
As a result of his letter, I contacted Suzie Huerta to offer my assistance to the art and literary magazine.
I am one of the members of the community who challenge the curriculum which is still being worked on halfway through the school year. I’ll admit that I probably would even if it were written down somewhere. The curriculum is a problem that Mr. Fortino or Mr. Robb can’t fix. Both the band and choir are almost victims of their own success. I sincerely hope that the band program will flourish, and the dropout rate from junior high will decrease. The choir offers a number of options, and all the choirs sound wonderful.
It is incorrect for Randy to say that Gilroy High School produces Harvard graduates. A more correct statement would be “Gilroy High produces Gilroy High School graduates” or “Dr. and Mrs. Bress produce children who graduate from Harvard.”
I can’t speak to the athletic program at Gilroy High because it really is not very important to me. I do read the sports page, and it seems to me that the high school makes the playoffs in many sports, and has county and state champions at the school. I assume that there are a number of fine athletes at Gilroy High. But when you look at the vast number of students who have graduated from Gilroy High over the years, there is a woeful lack of students who apply, are accepted at, or attend Ivy League schools. That is a direct result of weakness in the curriculum. I am certain that there are top-tier schools that would love to admit a Gilroy High graduate.
Part of the problem here in Gilroy is that the school district has a longstanding fixation with diversity and culture. The obsession with culture is standing directly in the path of progress towards the bold goals of the district. GUSD has a propensity for throwing the word “culture” into every document that gets produced.
In reading through the English Language Learners pages, I was astounded to read that the district finds one of its missions to be “cultural maintenance.”
Of course, it is directly at odds with itself, because the only culture they feel is worth maintaining is Mexican culture. They pretty much come right out and say it. A parent in the dual immersion program extols the virtues of his student learning U.S. and Mexican history and culture. One of the students in the ELL program talks about becoming a kindergarten teacher and teaching her students about Mexico. The ELL task force recommends after school and Saturday cultural programs. Reading through these pages almost made me cry. Focus on culture does not help students become academically successful. There is zero chance that a native Chinese speaker will be in a Gilroy classroom learning about Chinese culture. As a result, the Chinese child will be more successful in the classroom, because while they aren’t getting a daily ego boost, they are getting five solid hours of instructional time.
Because the current district strategic plan ends in June 2004, we have come to a time for setting new priorities in the district.
One of the items on the agenda is to update Districtwide Strategic Plan for 2004-07. It’s time for the district to revisit this policy. Valuing one culture so blatantly above all others has failed. It has failed in all respects. Mexican immigrants need their children to be held to the same standard as all others. I have no doubt at all that children whose parents are from Mexico are every bit as capable as children whose parents come from anywhere else.
Every month at the parent advisory council, I hear the voices of parents in two languages telling the superintendent that we all want the same thing for our children: tutoring in academic subjects, homework help, access to school libraries, and a chance for all our children to go to college.
Stop wasting scarce resources on the feel-good stuff and start teaching all students the California standards. That is how you close the gap. Let the parents do the cultural maintenance, just educate our children.
