2004: Maryland's reform odyssey - educational reform - includes related article - Recruitment & retention

Black Issues in Higher Education, Feb 22, 1996 by Karin Chenoweth

BALTIMORE, MD -- When states first began requiring students to meet minimum course requirements and pass competency tests before graduating high school, some educators worried that the new standards would cause students -- especially minority and disadvantaged students -- to fail at higher rates and drop out more often than was already the case.

Their thinking was that these students were already failing to meet existing standards. Raising standards, they argued, would simply force them further into an educational limbo.

As it turned out, the exact opposite happened. Although initial rates of passing were low, school systems with minimum standards report that more of their students are passing and -- perhaps the biggest surprise -- dropout rates are stable or declining.

In light of this, some states are now deciding that they should go beyond minimum standards and adopt a more rigorous academic experience, not just for those students thought gifted, but for everyone.

Although several states have begun efforts in this direction, one of the few states to link that kind of reform to higher education is Maryland, which has been slowly putting into place a system-wide reform that will eventually make a high school diploma not only a certificate of mastery, but a ticket to good jobs, higher education and even scholarship money.

"I want kids to have a diploma they're proud to hang on the wall," is the way state board of education member Walter Sondheim Jr. put it.

Corporate Support

Late in January, Maryland took a big step toward its plan to require high-level assessments when the state school board asked testing companies for bids to design ten tests, to be taken throughout the high school years.

To make sure the tests are challenging for all students and to guard against pressures to "dumb the tests down," state educators plan on having multiple levels. For example, achieving a score of 80 on the exams might guarantee high school graduation. A score of 85 or 90 might garner the student a special note on the diploma that he or she had graduated with merit or distinction. Higher scores might guarantee the ultimate reward of automatic entrance to a Maryland college and even scholarship money.

In addition, the Maryland Business Roundtable, which represents 70 of Maryland's biggest employers, has agreed that if this testing procedure becomes a reality, it will encourage businesses to use the diploma and the scores on the assessments as a way to make hiring decisions. A letter of support for the reforms was signed by the heads of such companies as Potomac Electric Power Company, Bethlehem Steed Corporation and Bell-Atlantic-MD.

This approach represents a turnaround of the old worry that teachers will abandon what should be taught in order to "teach to the test." By putting into place tests they think worthy of being taught to, Maryland officials are basing their reform on the expectation and hope that teachers will teach to the test. Nancy S. Grasmick, state superintendent of schools, tells teachers in a recent newsletter that "teaching to the test is in favor."

`High-stakes' Diplomas

If Maryland in fact implements these changes, it will in some ways be mirroring what some other nations do. In Germany, for example, admission to university and to prestigious apprenticeships are determined in large part by how well students do on exams in their equivalent of ninth- and 10th-grade.

But Maryland officials are not consciously patterning the state's system after any other nation. "It's just a matter of thinking through the incentives," says Christopher Cross, president of the state's school board and president of the Council for Basic Education. Cross drew a distinction between what he would like to see in Maryland and, for example, Japan, by saying, "Japan doesn't have the richness of second chances. We're not a society that would stand for -- nor should we -- that kind of rigidity."

Cross wants those high school tests to be what he calls "high stakes," and withholding diplomas from those who fail them is certainly one way to do that. For planning purposes, officials are assuming that 50 percent of the students will fail the first set of exams and will need to be retested after being provided with more instruction or other kind of help.

Dr. Helen Giles-Gee, associate vice-chancellor for academic affairs of the University of Maryland System (UM) and one of the behind-the-scenes theoreticians of the reform effort, contends that by setting clear, achievable standards and then providing students the support they need to meet them, Maryland will be providing a greater opportunity to all students -- but particularly poor and minority students.

"It's so exciting," she says. "And it has so much promise."

The `Seamless Web'

Giles-Gee has been part of the "Maryland Partnership for Teaching and Learning K-16," or "Maryland K-16" for short. Begun in November by the chancellor of the University of Maryland System, the superintendent of the state Department of Education and the state's secretary of higher education, Maryland K-16 has as its charge to make the transition from kindergarten through college a "seamless web."