Like rats leaving a sinking ship, bad policies continue fleeing the state’s executive branch as Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards’ time in office melts away – and even from unlikely sources.
One example is the loosening of high school graduation standards promulgated by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education scheduled to take effect this week. Until now, if students didn’t score barely better than fogging a mirror on two standardized tests – 38 percent and 10 percent – they didn’t qualify for graduation.
But this fall BESE, which through almost all of his eight years in office rebuffed measures favored by Edwards and his allies, awarded them a win by putting into place a highly subjective appeal process with little oversight that would waive that requirement. It narrowly passed only because as governor Edwards appointed three members who shared his view that government should maintain a monopoly on education that puts adults’ desires ahead of children’s needs – in this case, trying to make government-run schools look better and less likely to face sanctions by having higher graduation rates.
The main defector from the coalition in the past that largely had thwarted this agenda, Republican Holly Boffy whose term ends in less than a month, defended the change, which could apply to as much as three percent of non-qualifiers, as saying it would give a chance to students who are facing chemotherapy or who have “test anxiety.” Of course, it does students no good to send them into the world unprepared regardless of the reason that may have impeded them from demonstrating even abysmal competence, nor to cater to a surmountable psychological hurdle in a world where they will face all kinds of tests.
And she ended her term, after otherwise solid service, in further disgrace when, as BESE president, she tried illegally to impose the rule over two weeks early in early December, in order to apply it to the small proportion of students graduating mid-year. Fortunately, Superintendent Cade Brumley quickly alerted local education agencies not to enforce it, noting for it to apply he had to have defined an emergency situation which he had not. Boffy backed down a couple of days later and tried to save face over her subversion by saying the withdrawal would prevent distracting from its implementation.
In the background, incoming governor Republican Atty. Gen. Jeff Landry has made clear he opposes the policy and is poised to appoint BESE members willing to back him. Add to that results of fall elections that returned previous or introduced new members testifying they oppose it and it’s clear the policy is very much on borrowed time.
In fact, it may face swift termination, in time for BESE’s Jan. 17 meeting, especially as no regular meeting is scheduled for February. Landry should make it a priority to have his three appointees named by then.
Still, of the several states that have a testing component in place, until now only Louisiana didn’t have an appeals process. That’s something useful in the very rare cases where something happens to a student entirely beyond his control at the last minute that inhibits a performance up to his true capabilities, but certainly shouldn’t resemble the free-wheeling process about to hit the books.
So, a two-step process can resolve the issue, beginning with repeal as soon as possible of the flawed policy. The next real deadline is late springtime graduations, so a realistic policy could be available for BESE consideration by its Apr. 10 meeting. However, if the Department of Education needs longer, it shouldn’t rush the process because, as the present incident shows, no policy is better than a bad policy.
As long as the repeal happens quickly, few students will be harmed. Regrettably, much time and effort will have become wasted by this issue, but it’s better to get it right eventually than to do anything and make it worse.
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