State of the Schools address delivered; topics include funding,
proficiency
San Jose – If Colleen Wilcox gets her way, students will spend their summers in the classroom.
That was one of the changes the Santa Clara County Superintendent of Schools proposed during her State of the Schools address “Seize the Day (and the Year),” Friday morning.
In front of a packed room at the county office, the superintendent pointed to a chart that showed students in India, Korea, Russia, Brazil, Japan and Germany, spend much longer than Americans in the classroom. Americans receive an average of 180 days instructional time, while Indians spend almost 200 days in school.
“We operate under constraints of time that were formulated in a different era – an era when the United States was primarily a nation of farmers, who often relied on their children for seasonal help in the fields,” Wilcox said.
Summer break causes students to regress by at least one month, and even more for students who are already falling behind, she said. That means teachers must spend a month reviewing material before beginning to teach grade appropriate curriculum.
The summer vacation issue, was one of many topics that Wilcox addressed during her speech. She also spent a considerable amount of time discussing the rising number of English learners.
Although enrollment has increased substantially during the past two decades, the number of white students attending Santa Clara County schools has declined and are now outnumbered by Hispanics.
Consequently, in 20 years the English language learner population has jumped from 26,000 to more than 66,000, an increase of more than 250 percent.
Wilcox brought up those statistics to drive home the point that closing the achievement gap is essential.
“Demographic trends suggest that ethnicities of some of the lowest-achieving student groups will become increasingly more populous in the coming years,” she said. “As a society, we need this significant segment of citizens to be well-educated, to be able to make sound decisions, to vote intelligently and be productive workers.”
Wilcox also predicts, based on current trends, that by 2009 Asian students will surpass the Caucasian population. She also brought up some of county’s dismal proficiency statistics. Across the nation, less than one-third or about 25 percent of eighth-graders, test proficient on standardized tests in math and science, according to the National Assessment of Educational progress.
In California, less than 25 percent are proficient in science and math. In Santa Clara County, student’s proficiency is a bit higher than their peers throughout the state. But on the Academic Performance Index more than half of county schools have failed to reach the 800-point, the goal set by the state.
In Gilroy, Luigi Aprea Elementary School is the sole institution that’s scored 800 or above.
Although she stressed academic achievement and standardized tests, Wilcox also strayed from the topic of math, science and English to address the importance of the arts.
Because so much emphasis has been placed on test scores, the arts have suffered. Yet, a survey conducted in the Silicon Valley by a company called Cultural Initiatives, revealed that 89 percent of think arts classes should be required curriculum in public schools.
“But schools, as they focus ever more on the testing skills, run the risk of squelching those imaginations,” she said. “If we expect to maintain our position as the leader of the world in creativity and innovation, that imbalance in our classrooms will not serve us well.”
