A former student, Aleysha Ortiz, is suing the city of Hartford and the local board of education. Ortiz alleges she graduated without learning how to read or write. She claims it was due to negligence and lack of proper support for her developmental disabilities.
The lawsuit claims Ortiz was denied necessary testing for dyslexia. It also claims she was removed from special education curriculum and only tested for developmental disabilities on her last day of school, revealing significant unmet educational needs.
I hate to go ‘Boy, I don’t buy it’ but, uh, I kinda don’t?
This is one of those things that COULD happen, as long as every teacher, every administrator and the state itself were all intentionally trying to make it happen.
CT has standardized tests that are required to be taken to progress through school, so how can someone who can’t read or write pass those?
And EVERY teacher she had from first grade on just accepted the fact she clearly was unable to read or write, and thus was almost certainly not doing any work, and just decided that’s a-ok and we’ll just pass her along anyways without doing anything?
Somehow feels like there’s a lot more to this story than just her side as presented by that article.
Me: “My kid has a learning disability. Can you give her some reasonable accommodations?”
My Kids School: “But does she really though?”
Me: “Uh, yeah. She has a diagnosis. From a psychiatrist. Also, you have noticed her grades are abysmal, right?”
School: “They’re not that bad. She’s actually doing pretty well.”
Me: “She has mostly D’s and F’s. Is that seriously what you consider ‘pretty well’?”
School: “…”
I’m doing some major paraphrasing but this is the gist of actual conversations with my daughters school administration. I’m not saying I believe it’s very likely that someone could graduate without being able to read and write. I’m just saying that in some school districts, there’s a greater than zero percent chance of that happening.
they have been doing it for decades, even our school passed people with that kinda grade to graduation. not surprised at my local CC i see people struggling with arimethic courses.
As a teacher, admin will not listen.
“Hey this kid cannot read. Hey this kid smells like shit and has been wearing the same outfit for the past two weeks. Hey this kid is telling her classmates which gas stations will sell vape carts to minors.”
As a teacher, do you pass students who cannot read? While your grievances are fair, OP makes some very valid points.
Yes, I did, because failing a student required me to set up a parent meeting and getting them to agree to a contract with a list of assignments that the student could turn in at any point up until the last day of the semester.
I’ve read that in some states, it doesn’t matter if they pass or fail. Or that failing isn’t a thing that happens to students.
Either way, they don’t get held back. Grade level is a stand in for age, nothing more, in some places.
I graduated many years ago now, but I did graduate with someone who could not read or write. He was a sport prodigy, so they lied to keep him playing. It definitely happens.
I don’t know about CT, but I deliberately failed one of my state required tests in NJ and they passed me anyway. It’s all theater.
I absolutely buy it. I know someone whose job it is to teach kids in grade 6-8 how to read. Some can’t read three letter words. This is in a blue state. This teacher I know frequently talks about most of her colleagues being grossly negligent in a variety of ways.
i can confirm, in my hs in a very blue cali area, tons of people were struggling the courses, and they just passed them for the most part. once they get into Community college, you can see a ton of them struggling in the most basic courses( of course students are from all over the us) but more or less they come from the same HS system(pass all D- high F grade earners). the professors themselves also notice this trend, at the time i was in CC, they said people were only getting a 9th grade math education, and a 10th grade reading writing essay education), it has gotten worst since then.
our CC also had university level stem courses, and you can imagine most dont do well in the class(C isnt really considered a good thing), in terms if you want to transfer to a UNIVERSITY(NOT A non-low level tiered one)
(without looking into it to verify) isn’t this likely because of “no child left behind”?
if it is, they’re doing it wrong. it means to help everyone graduate, not abandon everyone and set the bar so low everyone auto-graduates
No Child Left Behind was designed to defund schools. If it wanted to fix things, poor test results would result in a investigation and overhaul of the district. Instead it just punished the school with less federal funds.
yea so they end up just passing failing students to keep the funding going, which is kinda sad, because it will be hard for them to even survive in CC even(in our CC like many if you get too low for too many semesters you will get probation on your record. and there have been several incidence that people were expelled that way, and in these probation classes the instructor confirms that there were people that attempted to come back on the property of the school.