by John Krupa
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Tuesday, December 5, 2006
SPRINGDALE — The state’s education commissioner said Monday that legislators need to make a more rigorous ninth- through 12th-grade curriculum mandatory for all students.
Education Commissioner Ken James also said state leaders must eventually expand the school day and school year if they want Arkansas high school students to compete with national and global peers.
“We’ve got a 19th-century, agrarian [high school] model with a 20th-century, industrial curriculum,” James told about 90 educators at the Jones Center for Families during a regional meeting on improving high school education.
“We are now charged with preparing kids for a 21st-century, digital world. The only thing we are doing differently is we don’t turn out people to pick cotton,” he said. The commissioner is in the midst of a three-week campaign calling for improving high school education. The tour grew out of a two-hour conference on high school education James cohosted with Gov. Mike Huckabee in Little Rock in September. At that conference, James said that allowing students to take an easier curriculum sends a mixed message to the state’s 452,000 students at a time when state leaders are convinced that higher-level academic classes are essential to success in the work force or in college.
James spoke in Hot Springs and El Dorado last week. He visits Fort Smith today and plans to speak in Jonesboro next week.
The state Department of Education has sponsored a series of radio and television public service announcements and has started a Web site, www. nextsteparkansas.org, that supports the initiative.
James is trying to build momentum for the elimination of an “opt-out” clause that allows high school students to follow an easier curriculum with parental permission. About 10 percent of Arkansas’ eighthand ninth-graders this year, about 7,000 students, opted out of the state’s math and scienceladen 22-unit Smart Core high school curriculum last year. Up to 40 percent of students opt out of that college-preparatory curriculum in some school districts, James said.
This year’s ninth-graders, the class of 2010, will be the first class that must complete the Smart Core curriculum to graduate or opt out with parental permission.
The Smart Core requires four units of math: Algebra 1, geometry, Algebra 2, and one additional unit from a list of courses like trigonometry and calculus. Three units of laboratory science also are required. The alternative, the 22-unit Common Core, requires no math beyond geometry, and the science requirement specifies only biology and a physical science.
Students need the Smart Core’s depth of math and science instruction whether they plan to enroll at the University of Arkansas or work as a pipe fitter, James said. He said 52 percent of Arkansas college students require remediation upon admission and 76 percent of Arkansas employers say recent high school graduates lack adequate math and reading skills.
The state Board of Education could eliminate the optout clause itself, the commissioner said, but the move will have more effect with state lawmakers’ support.
State Rep. Mike Kenney, RSiloam Springs, however, said he thinks the General Assembly will not vote to eliminate the opt-out clause during the January session.
“I just don’t see that happening. There are too many questions as to how it’s going to work,” said Kenney, a member of the House Education Committee. “It’s not something you can just rush out overnight.”
One of the key questions is where the state will find the additional math and science teachers necessary if all children enroll in the Smart Core curriculum. James said the state lacks enough secondarylevel math and science teachers to eliminate the Common Core today. The commissioner said officials may need to offer additional financial incentives.
Some also worry that eliminating the Common Core will lead to a flood of remediation and an increase in the dropout rate.
Jim Rollins, superintendent of the 16,511-student Springdale School District, acknowledged that some of his students will struggle to complete the Smart Core. Education research shows, however, that students perform better and the achievement gap between children shrinks when students take more challenging courses, Rollins said.
Rebecca Imes, a senior at Springdale’s Har-Ber High School, agreed. She said students who would have chosen the easier route will simply “suck it up and do the work.”
“Even if you get a C in an AP class ... you’re going to be more prepared than the student making an A in underwater basket weaving,” she said.
