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The entire city is like this. After elementary school, there is a lottery or application system for middle and high schools, and you can apply and go to any school in the entire city.
I don't think it's wrong to use test scores. Lottery is worse because it could lead to more intelligent kids being sent to worse schools where they will get a poorer education despite their proven ability to learn more. At least the test scores serve as a basis for them to earn their spot in better schools (similar to the approach that elite high schools like Stuy and Bronx Science use). For as long as some schools are good while others are bad, you will always have students who will be excluded from the good schools.
I have to say that I disagree. I think for college level and maybe even high school self motivation should be a bigger factor but young children deserve a more level playing ground. I don't think these tests are fair in determining intelligence (in fact studies show they are not -read Nurture Shock) and even if they were - that entitles them to better resources, facilities, teachers? Doesn't seem right. Should healthier people be entitled to better health care?
The entire city is like this. After elementary school, there is a lottery or application system for middle and high schools, and you can apply and go to any school in the entire city.
Yes. I am pretty sure that entry to all city middle and high schools is now application based--no more lotteries and no more district based admissions after elementary grades.
The city made this change a few years ago to level the playing field--theoretically now a student who lives in a 4 million dollar brownstone in Brooklyn Heights has no better shot at getting into a good public middle school than a kid living in a rent-stabilized apartment in Brownsville. In the old system, kids whose parents could afford to buy or rent in good districts automatically got to go to good schools--and poorer kids were out of luck, unless they were bright enough to get into one of the few magnet schools.
The downside, as I and others have said, is that it puts way too much emphasis on standardized tests. They are pretty lame tools that do a questionable job of what they are designed to do--determine if kids have adequately learned the state standards for that grade. At best, that's all the tests do--they don't test how good a student a child is or how intelligent he/she is. They don't test how good a teacher is. All they test is whether, on the day of the test, the student can "use common, grade-appropriate Greek and Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word" and enough of the other esoteric info he/she's been taught in the preceding months.
Forest_Hills_Daddy wrote: . . . Lottery is worse because it could lead to more intelligent kids being sent to worse schools where they will get a poorer education despite their proven ability to learn more. At least the test scores serve as a basis for them to earn their spot in better schools . . .
Along with VRV, I disagree with this. I find it to be a repulsive idea that the more "intelligent" students deserve the better schools.
Sunny and VRV, there is nothing fair about not having enough good public schools in NYC to accomodate all students. That is the root problem. Until you find a way to fit everyone in good schools, you have to accept that some kids will be excluded one way or another.
If you use lottery, you will be excluding many kids who for the most part worked harder and gave more to their education. Does that sound right? What will be their reward for giving extra effort to their studies if they know there's more than half a chance that they will land in a bad school where they will get a mediocre education regardless of how hard they work?
At least with testing, there is a semblance that their hard-to-get spot in a good school has been earned. Now that is a good thing to make of in a bad situation.
What an amazing and backward system in NYC! They decide in 4th grade what kids are smart, which are not, and then ship off the dumb ones to the bad schools?! How have they not gotten sued yet?
The plaintiffs' lawyers move to Nassau and Westchester.
The plaintiffs' lawyers move to Nassau and Westchester.
So true!!!
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