Low standards let kids sink

The local pool won't let kids on the diving board unless they can tread water for 60 seconds, writes Rick Hess. When his eight-year-old failed the test, "he rushed back in tears, complaining about the unfairness of it all." The teenage lifeguard recommended a little more practice.

Photo: Alex P/Pexels

The lifeguard knows high expectations are worth the tears. Go easy on the swim test and eventually a kid dives in, can't make it to the side of the pool and needs to be rescued. Or isn't rescued in time. That's why Hess said, "Thank you."

In education, there's little support for people who say, "That's not good enough. Do better," he writes. In a way , the consequences of low standards are life-threatening. But it's not obvious until years later.

President Trump is reinstating the Presidential Fitness Test, which was discontinued in 2013 in favor of a "more holistic 'barometer' of student health," he writes. In the past, "students who hit certain benchmarks got a certificate." Not a big deal.

In a New York Times story, For Some, Return of Presidential Fitness Test Revives Painful Memories, a 60-year-old woman calls the test, "survive or fail. It was Darwinist."

"Now, I don’t think Charles Darwin would think kids having to do pull-ups really captures the adapt-or-die essence of On the Origin of Species, writes Hess. "But this kind of overwrought anxiety has become pervasive, undermining our ability to set clear expectations for kids or confidently stand by them."

Truth is, it’s easy for educators to give an inflated grade, ignore a missed deadline, excuse an absence, or look the other way when a kid misbehaves. . . . The kid is happy, the parents are happy, the bosses are happy to avoid a hassle, and no one’s the wiser. This is the essence of Ted Sizer’s immortal “Horace’s compromise” — that the teacher pretends to teach and the students pretend to learn.

Educators are told that "demanding good behavior or on-time assignments is bigoted or inequitable," he writes. "Sending misbehaving students to the office" is seen "as evidence they are failing to control their classroom." So they wave students along.

Eventually, many of those passed-along students will dive into a college class or a job training program or a job that requires reading, writing and math proficiency and the ability to meet deadlines and obey instructions. They'll drown.