Advocating for our Students: It’s Necessary at the Policy Level Too

by JESSE SCACCIA

I was reading my local paper today when I came across an interesting article. Currently schools in Virginia Beach, Virginia only give solid letter grades. The discussion involves adding in the ‘plus’ as an option. The net result will be an upward shift in grade point averages.

Here’s the full article.

You might be thinking, Why does this matter to me as a teacher? It’s significant for two important reasons:

1. This will raise the average grade point average in VB schools, just with a simple shift in policy. Will the students learn more? Of course not. But they’ll have a better chance of getting into the most competitive universities, and if we can help our kids get into college–no matter how–we need to be involved in making it happen.

2. If more students in your school are going to college, and if the higher level students are going to better schools than they otherwise would have, the overall educational environment improves. For the lower achieving students, the prospect of going to college becomes just a little more real. Think about the three or four most disengaged students in your classes… now imagine if those students saw college as a real possibility. They’d try a little harder, don’t you think?

Public school teachers have far more important things to worry about than issues like this, but it’s imperative that at least some of us do. So much of a teachers’ day is dictated from above. If we’re not poking around ‘up there’ and giving our two cents it is us, our schools, and our students who suffer.