Page 442 - Essencials of Sociology

Problems in U.S. Education—and Their Solutions 415

13.5 Discuss mediocrity in
Problems in U.S. Education—and education, grade inflation, social
Their Solutions promotion, raising standards,
cheating by administrators, and
Now that we’ve looked at some of the dynamics within the classroom, let’s turn to three violence in schools.
problems facing U.S. education—mediocrity, cheating, and violence—and consider
potential solutions.
Watch on MySocLab
Mediocrity Video: Current Issues in
U.S. Education
The Rising Tide of Mediocrity. Since I know you love taking tests, let’s see how you
do on these three questions:
1. How many goals are on a basketball court? a. 1 b. 2 c. 3 d. 4
2. How many halves are in a college basketball game? a. 1 b.2 c. 3 d. 4
3. How many points does a three-point field goal account for in a basketball game?
a. 1 b. 2 c. 3 d. 4
I know this sounds like a joke, but it isn’t. Sociologist Robert Benford (2007) got his
hands on a copy of a twenty-question final examination given to basketball players who
took a credit course on coaching principles at the University of Georgia. It is often dif-
ficult to refer to athletes, sports, and academics in the same breath, but this is about as
mediocre as mediocrity can get.
Let’s move to a broader view of the mediocrity that plagues our educational system
like pollution plagues gasoline engines:
• Arizona officials gave their high school sophomores a math test covering the math
that sophomores should know. One of ten passed.
• To get its students out of high school, Arkansas dropped its passing score in math to
24 out of 100 (Urbina 2010a).
• In Washington, D.C., most of the students who graduate from high school operate
at about the fifth grade level. How do they graduate? When they fail a course, they
take something called “Credit Recovery,” which does not require a test (Rossiter
2012).
• In Florida, only 27 percent of the state’s 4th graders
passed the reading test. That didn’t sound good, so the
state dropped the passing grade. Then 80 percent passed. Figure 13.4 National Results of
Much better. (Kristof 2012)
the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT)
The SATs How are we doing on the SATs? Look at Figure
13.4. You can see how fast nd far the scores dropped from the
1960s to 1980. At that point, educators sounded an alarm— 550
and even Congress expressed concern. School officials decided
that they had better do something if they didn’t want to lose 540
their jobs.
Here’s the good news. When school officials raised their 530
standards, the math scores started to climb, and they con-
tinued going up for the next 20 years. Although scores have Score 520
dropped recently, today’s high school seniors score the same
in math as seniors did in the 1960s. Administrators are requir- 510 Verbal
ing more of math teachers, who, in turn, are demanding more
of students. Each is performing according to these higher 500 Math
expectations.
But there is also the bad news. Look at the verbal scores 490 1967 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020
on Figure 13.4. Their drop from the 1960s, was even larger Year
than the drop in math. They have stayed down, and now have Note: Possible scores range from 200 to 800.
dropped even more. No one knows why these scores are so Sources: By the author. Based on College Board 2012; Statistical Abstract
low, but the usual suspects have been rounded up: “dummied of the United States 2013:Table 266.